Flat income tax schemes, like sales and use taxes, and user fees, are all regressive: striking the poor harder than the classes above them. The appeal of flat taxes (and the others mentioned) is their perceived simplicity in both assessment and collection. But that's an assumption that flies in the face of historical practice.
As you say, the rich always find a way to avoid taxes of all kinds. They pay accountants and politicians to ensure that. The middle class may not have many politicians on their payroll, but they do have accountants -- and have learned how to use them. Besides, the progressivity (a word that the tech giants still don't know how to spell) of our current tax structure is inconsistent and intentionally incoherent.
Just a note: the US tax system seems to have been at its fairest (a very relative term) during the late 1940s through to the Kennedy tax cuts in the early 60s when the highest rates were in the 90% range and when estate taxes still took a credible bite out of ultra wealthy generational wealth. Of course all that money collected didn't go to help eradicate poverty. It mostly went to build warships, bombers, missiles and the nukes they carried.
>like sales and use taxes, and user fees, are all regressive
Under no circumstances are consumption taxes "regressive". Consumption taxes are the only tax any free people should tolerate. The poor will never pay more in outright dollars, or in percentage. It's only "regressive" if you you stupidly count money that isn't spent, which is entirely pointless because of course money not spent won't get hit with a consumption tax (it will once it DOES get spent, the more you spend the more you pay, which means consumption taxes are PROGRESSIVE). Furthermore, any good implementation of a consumption (VAT, etc.) tax is going to tax luxury goods at much higher rate than consumer staples.
> Under no circumstances are consumption taxes "regressive".
They absolutely are “regressive” in the objective sense “progressive/
” and “regressive” are applied to taxation (which is distinct from normative uses of the pair, which are common in other areas of political discussion), in that they tend to tax a lesser (absolute and marginal) share of income with increasing income, due to declining marginal propensity to consume.
> Consumption taxes are the only tax any free people should tolerate.
There are obviously an infinite number of potential systems of moral axioms for which this is true (the most trivial being any in which it is taken as a moral axiom), and also an infinite number in which it is not. However, as you’ve provided neither the basic principles in which your belief in this is grounded or your reasoning connecting the conclusion to those principles, you’ve provided no reason for anyone who doesn't already hold this belief to adopt it.
> Furthermore, any good implementation of a consumption (VAT, etc.) tax is going to tax luxury goods at much higher rate than consumer staples.
That's an interesting “No True Scotsman”, but concrete consumption tax proposals (e.g., “FairTax”) often do not do this.
>in that they tend to tax a lesser (absolute and marginal) share of income with increasing income
It is pointless to look at income in this regards. You come to a false conclusion that a tax is regressive because the percentage of income is taxed less for the "wealthy". This only due to the fact that the wealthy are spending a smaller percentage of their income.
You can only look at money SPENT, not at income. If someone makes 500 mil a year but only spends 80k, then you you compare to someone who made 80k and spent 80k then yeah it appears "regressive" because they paid the same in taxes (assuming they bought the same things). However when the person that made 500 mil goes to spend they remaining 420 min, they will be taxed. You can keep all the money you want, stick in your ears, put it a pool and dive in it like you Scrooge McDuck, who cares, once you actually try to do something useful with the money, that is when it would be taxed. More money you spend, more you are taxed, that is progressive.
> It is pointless to look at income in this regards.
Whether or not you subjectively think it is pointless or not, the well-established meaning of “progressive” and “regressive” taxation does loom at income.
If you want to invent your own terminology to reflect the considerations you believe are important, great, but overloading established terminology used consistently by people with varying normative beliefs about the subject matter to mean something completely different because you don't like the way it maps terms on to facts isn't helpful in communication.
I happen to mostly agree with you, but to play devil's advocate, consider the practical reality that government (as currently expressed) is expensive. New Hampshire is a great example of your model working well: nearly half of its tax revenue is consumption-derived (compared to ~10% of New York's). Except New York collects more than double the tax per head versus NH.
Let's assume that we can't easily shrink the size of government. Middle class incomes are just too lucrative of a piggy bank, which is why tax policy is so reliant on it. How do you make up for the $3.3 trillion in income and payroll tax revenues without taking people's property? The US only imported $2.5 trillion in 2019, so you'd need an import tariff rate of 130%! If you used a federal sales tax instead, you'd likely need a rate of > 24% to replace the income tax (extrapolating from New Jersey as a reasonable lower bound).
As you say, the rich always find a way to avoid taxes of all kinds. They pay accountants and politicians to ensure that. The middle class may not have many politicians on their payroll, but they do have accountants -- and have learned how to use them. Besides, the progressivity (a word that the tech giants still don't know how to spell) of our current tax structure is inconsistent and intentionally incoherent.
Just a note: the US tax system seems to have been at its fairest (a very relative term) during the late 1940s through to the Kennedy tax cuts in the early 60s when the highest rates were in the 90% range and when estate taxes still took a credible bite out of ultra wealthy generational wealth. Of course all that money collected didn't go to help eradicate poverty. It mostly went to build warships, bombers, missiles and the nukes they carried.