In April of 2026, we might all consider not paying our federal taxes and continue to do so until Congress gives the United States a fair and progressive tax code that does not increase taxes on anyone making $150k/year or less and exempts taxation of income on all income of individuals and families at or below the poverty line.
Instead of paying federal taxes as is normal in April of 2026 and beyond, due to the current unjust political taxation as it is currently established and implemented, we could instead have our taxes prepared and filed as usual and all penalties for non-payment of taxes during the boycott are waived until Congress produces a new progressive and fair tax code, and pay only state taxes but not pay federal taxes until the following demands are met:
A new tax code that ends tax breaks for the rich and adds additional tax brackets to tax ALL upper levels of income.
Restores IRS funding, staffing, and functioning to Biden administration levels.
Fair and progressive taxation on all corporate income and the elimination of exemptions, waivers, exceptions with enforcement penalties for non-payment of taxes.
Automatic auditing and taxation of all overseas tax haven accounts and closing all loopholes and preferential treatment of expatriated wealth.
A one time inheritance tax as proposed by Elizabeth Warren.
A tax on all securities and stock transactions.
A review of all federal subsidies and the elimination of all subsidies to profitable corporations.
Convert federal subsidies in the Farm Bill that pay for monoculture crops and use it to pay for Restorative Agricultural farming/ranching which would also greatly mitigate climate change and greatly improve a carbon sink back into our soil.
Give it some thought. A tax boycott might be able to help us get Congress to do what it has needed to do for a long time: Give us a fair and progressive tax code.
If you do not like what the government is doing under Trump/Musk and the republican party, next year, in April of 2026, for the 2025 tax year, if you can, please consider not paying your taxes.
If enough people do not pay taxes and it truly gets the attention of Congress, it could serve as incentive for Congress to rewrite the tax code; a tax code that is fair and does not increase the tax on people making less than 400k a year but taxes all upper levels of income, imposes a responsible corporate tax burden, cuts wasteful and fraudulent subsidies, waivers, exclusions, limits, creates more tax brackets for the upper levels of income that have not been adequately taxed since the 1970s, closes tax shelter loopholes and offshore tax-free havens by making them taxable accounts, we would finally have the tax code that is fair that we need.
There are penalties for not filing your taxes at tax time. Filing your taxes prevents having to pay penalties for not filing them. The two options are filing, or not filing your taxes.
There are late fee penalties if you don’t pay your taxes.
If enough people do not pay their taxes that it gets the attention of Congress and makes Congress realize that it has to do something and fix the tax code, penalties for not filing taxes and for not paying them during a boycott should be rescinded. But this needs to be a condition that is understood by Congress by the people not paying taxes until there is a new fair tax code in place. We, the people, we, the tax payers, can resume paying our taxes as we have always done, after we have a fair tax code and when we have a guarantee from Congress that there will be no penalties for having not filed or paid taxes until then, however many years that may take.
Not paying taxes for as long as it takes to get Congress to rewrite a new fair tax code could take a long time. It may take years. However, not paying taxes for one, or two, or more years until we have a fair tax code, if we end up with a fair tax code, would be worthwhile.
Is Private Equity Benevolent or a Conundrum or both? What is Private Equity?
Approximately 6.5 percent of the American economy, based on the limited concept of GDP, is in private equity. That is 6.5% of the $29.35 trillion dollars, the current GDP, or, $1.90775 trillion dollars.
When involved in individual business investments, private equity capital is invested into a target company either by an investment management company (private equity firm), a venture capital fund, a hedge fund, or an “angel” investor, a wealthy individual who invests personal money in early-stage companies. Angel investors expect to take ownership positions in the companies they buy into because their capital is unsecured—they have no claim on the company’s assets. There are 11,218 Private Equity, Hedge Funds & Investment Vehicles businesses in the US as of 2023, a decline of -2.2% from 2022. There are as many “Angel” investors in the market as there are people wealthy enough to buy into the industry. The fact that private security investors have no claim on the company’s assets should be viewed as a red flag and as a potential cause of negative events that may occur after private equity acquires businesses as a result of predatory acquisitions and subsequent practices. Each category of investor in PE has specific financial goals, management preferences, and investment strategies for profiting from their investments. Private equity provides working capital to the target company to finance the expansion of the company with the development of new products and services, restructuring of operations, management, and formal control and ownership of the company.
Private equity remains a major driver of economic growth by supporting small businesses and paying high wages to millions of workers that private equity-backed businesses employ. In 2022, private equity directly generated $1.7 trillion of GDP in the U.S., approximately 6.5% of GDP for that year.
The four main areas within private equity are venture capital, growth equity, buyouts, and distressed or special situations investing. Each area focuses on different stages of a company’s lifecycle and investment strategy, from early-stage startups to mature businesses needing turnaround strategies.
Private equity, when it is not involved in predatory practices, can help companies grow, saves local jobs, and boosts the retirement savings of millions of Americans. The caveat is that predatory practices create significant risks for workers, businesses, and the economy.
Public companies bought by private equity management firms are approximately 10 times more likely to go bankrupt than a control group subject to the same market forces. That’s largely because of how PE firms purchase companies. PE investors, typically wealthy individuals or institutional investors, often fund their acquisitions by taking out large loans. Frequently, about 70% of the money that PE investors use to buy a company will come from loans—allowing them to only pay 30% from their own funds. The acquired company then becomes responsible for paying off this debt. This is called a “leveraged buyout.”
In some cases, PE acquisition can help revive struggling businesses by bringing in new leadership or needed capital. However, the high debt levels associated with leveraged buyouts can raise substantial risks. For example, if revenues from the acquired company are not enough to pay off its debts, it can go bankrupt, which in turn leads to job loss and loss of the services that the company provided to the economy. Even if the acquired company does not fall into bankruptcy, PE firms typically seek to raise short-term revenue, in many cases through drastic cost-cutting measures like layoffs—which come at the direct expense of the company’s workers. The PE firm will then be able to place the acquired company back on the market and sell it to new buyers at a higher price. This is what is called a “buy, strip and flip” business model. PE acquisitions are not public companies and are exempt from publicly disclosing information about their operations, risks, finances, and liabilities—making it difficult to evaluate their performance and possible risks to the broader economy.
Private equity-owned businesses are concentrated in lower-wage industries, impacting job stability and pay for workers. When private equity is involved in predatorial activities it may not be creating more jobs and may, in fact, be working against, not improving or expanding the American economy for workers and companies involved in the transaction or for the economy.
Who benefits from private equity? By providing capital, operational knowledge, and strategic support, private equity can help lower middle market economy businesses thrive. Private equity (PE) has long been a driving force in the financial world, but its influence on the lower middle market economy in the United States is particularly noteworthy. However, predatory practices create significant risks for workers, businesses, and the economy. Private equity-owned businesses are concentrated in lower-wage industries, impacting job stability and pay for workers. Private equity’s growth in the health care sector negatively impacts Americans’ well-being. Private equity growth is also contributing to higher prices for food and other essentials. Research shows that New Mexico is at the highest risk of exploitation by private equity. Congressional Democrats are taking on private equity’s harmful practices, fighting for Americans’ health care, and ensuring wealthy CEOs pay their fair share. This endeavor is not being joined in by Congressional Republicans. While Trump’s policies supported private equity in a hands-off relationship with the industry, the Biden-Harris administration has worked to hold these companies accountable for the American people. My prediction for the four upcoming years of Trump’s second term in office is that the country will experience an increase in predatorial private equity business activities and that there may well be negative impacts and consequences on commerce, American companies and their workers and on the economy.
It has frequently been claimed by industry spokespersons that private equity-owned businesses create more jobs than they destroy, though the academic research paints a much more ambiguous picture. Even when private equity is good capitalism, it isn’t necessarily good for society.
Safeguards and regulations and some changes in the laws that regulate private equity can be made which could mitigate the negative impacts of predatorial practices by private equity and reduce the risks it poses to the economy.
Here are some of the things that can be done to protect and provide for a more stable economy:
Make private equity executives legally liable for the damage they cause.
Stop looting that enriches PE executives at the expense of workers, communities, and businesses.
Close tax loopholes and change rules that encourage predatory financial activities.
Protect workers if employers go bankrupt.
Require PE firms to be fair and transparent to investors in disclosing costs and returns.
Each year the President’s annual proposed federal budget is sent to Congress from the White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB) for both houses of Congress to consider and for each to write its own appropriations bill. After one house finishes its appropriations bill it sends it to the other house of Congress. Both bills are considered by both houses of Congress, and a final bill is written by both houses and then sent to the President for a signature. When the final appropriations bill is finished and sent to the WH for the President’s signature, the OMB makes final decisions about the agencies’ proposed budgets and in that way the appropriations bill is distributed.
High-Income taxpayers paid the majority of federal Income Taxes. In 2021, the bottom half of taxpayers earned 10.4 percent of total AGI and paid 2.3 percent of all federal individual income taxes. The top 1 percent earned 26.3 percent of total AGI and paid 45.8 percent of all federal income taxes. March 13, 2024. (Adjusted gross income, also known as (AGI), is defined as total income minus deductions, or “adjustments” to income that you are eligible to take.
Taken as a whole, the federal income tax is progressive, meaning that those with higher incomes pay at higher rates. But the system’s progressivity tends to break down at the very uppermost income levels. (I would argue that progressivity tends to break down starting with incomes from $1 million and higher. See my opinion notes at the end of the essay.)
Average effective tax rates, defined here as total income tax as a percentage of AGI, were highest among taxpayers with AGIs between $2 million and $10 million (nearly 28%). The average effective tax rate for taxpayers with AGIs of $10 million or more was lower (25.5%), mainly because they tend to get more of their income from dividends and long-term capital gains, which are taxed at lower rates than wages, salaries and other so-called “ordinary income.”
Corporate tax brings in smaller share of federal revenues
Although the focus this time of year is on individual income taxes, corporate income taxes are also a significant source of federal revenue. This year, the Office of Management and Budget projects that the government will collect $546 billion in corporate taxes, or 11.4% of estimated total receipts. That’s less than half the corporate-tax share of total revenues that prevailed in the 1950s.
Several big corporations, including Amazon, Nike and FedEx, have come under fire in recent years for paying little to no income tax. But comparing corporate and individual income taxes is tricky. For one thing, corporations can report income and taxes differently to the IRS than they do publicly to investors. They can also spread losses in a given year across several years’ worth of taxes – meaning, in effect, that taxes due on this year’s profits can be offset by a previous year’s losses.
Besides average effective tax rates, another way to look at the relative burden on different groups of taxpayers is by examining how much of the total bill they foot.
The IRS collected $1.66 trillion in individual income taxes in 2020 (excluding the $78.6 billion in negative tax liabilities referred to earlier). Close to 54% of that sum came from taxpayers with AGIs between $100,000 and $1 million – a group that accounted for just under a fifth of all returns filed (31.3 million), and about 30% of all taxable returns (31 million).
At the very top of the income ladder, only 0.02% of all returns filed in 2020 showed AGIs of $10 million or more, but those taxpayers collectively paid $210.2 billion in taxes after refundable tax credits, or 12.6% of total individual income tax collections.
Tax rate
Single
Head of household
Married filing jointly or qualifying widow
Married filing separately
Source: IRS
10%
$0 to $11,600
$0 to $16,550
$0 to $23,200
$0 to $11,600
12%
$11,601 to $47,150
$16,551 to $63,100
$23,201 to $94,300
$11,601 to $47,150
22%
$47,151 to $100,525
$63,101 to $100,500
$94,301 to $201,050
$47,151 to $100,525
24%
$100,526 to $191,950
$100,501 to $191,950
$201,051 to $383,900
$100,526 to $191,950
32%
$191,951 to $243,725
$191,951 to $243,700
$383,901 to $487,450
$191,951 to $243,725
35%
$243,726 to $609,350
$243,701 to $609,350
$487,451 to $731,200
$243,726 to $365,600
37%
$609,351 or more
$609,351 or more
$731,201 or more
$365,601 or more
Here’s how that works for a single person with taxable income of $58,000 per year:
$58,000 to $44,725 taxed at 22%
$44,725 to $11,000 taxed at 12%
$11,000 to $0 taxed at 10%
The highest tax bracket is 37%. In 2023, for single filers, it applies to incomes over $578,126, and for married couples filing jointly, it applies to incomes over $693,751. Income exceeding these thresholds is taxed at a 37% rate.
The rules governing what constitutes business or individual income, and how it should be taxed, are only part of what makes the U.S. tax code as complex as it is. One rough measure of that complexity: The printed version of the 2021 edition of the Internal Revenue Code runs a total of 4,074 pages, excluding front matter. More than half of those pages (2,448) are devoted to the income tax.
The following is my opinion about the Federal Tax Code as it is currently composed and the questions I have about it. These are also my criticisms of the tax code and how I believe it could be improved to make it a truly progressive tax code.
Income of $578,126 for a single filer and $693,751 for married couples filing jointly, and up, are taxed at the maximum tax bracket of 37%. That is the top tax bracket in the Federal tax code. Income above these sums is taxed 37%.
The bottom half of taxpayers had an income of 10.4% of total AGI and paid 2.3 % of all federal individual income taxes. Taxpayers with AGIs between $100,000 and $1 million made up about 30% of all taxable returns and paid 54% of the income taxes collected. These taxpayers make up about 30% of taxpayers but pay about 54% of the tax bill. Adjustments should be made so that perhaps this group has a tax burden of closer to 30%, the approximate percentage of taxpayers, instead of the 54% they pay now. Taxpayers with income between $1 million and $10 million paid approximately 31% of total individual income tax collection. Taxpayers with an income of $10 million or more made up 0.02% of taxpayers and in the 37% tax bracket paid 12.6% of total individual income tax collections. The discrepancies that exist from one group to the others begs the question of whether the tax burden is equally and fairly shared among all income groups and all tax brackets. A fairer tax code would have more tax brackets for the higher incomes. The total income tax collected on incomes above $10 million should be higher than 12.6%. It should be higher than the other brackets. The tax burden on income from $1 million to $10 million should remain higher than lower tax bracket groups but perhaps slightly lower than they currently are. It’s not rocket science. It’s a matter of fairness with higher incomes paying progressively higher taxes. And with all income, especially at higher levels, being taxed fairly.
Other considerations and changes that should be made are that capital gains and dividends should be taxed as income in corresponding tax brackets; in other words, capital gains and dividends should be taxed like “ordinary” income.
Corporations should be taxed at consistent rates and should not be allowed to pay little or no taxes. After all, corporations are people too. So, like the rest of the people who pay their taxes, corporations should also pay their fair share of taxes. Corporate income taxes should be uniform and consistent. Back taxes or unpaid taxes should be recovered.
I would welcome comments, criticism, and corrections, and further discussion to develop a more comprehensive picture of the tax code and how it can be improved. So, please, feel free to chime in.
A top priority of republicans is to slash federal spending on all kinds of regulations, policies, and laws that protect the American people.
Regulations keep our air and water clean, make polluters responsible for reducing emissions and cleaning up toxic messes made by them. Regulations protect consumers by preventing usurious fees by unscrupulous banks and thereby help keep more money in consumers pockets. Anti trust regulations keep corporations from becoming monopolies and injuring a truly free market. If you have some security in retirement because you have Social Security and Medicare, regulations make it so.
These are just three kinds of regulations, environmental, consumer/banking, and retirement/social safety net, that republican working not on behalf of their constituents but on behalf of their billionaire political patrons, want to gut.
There are many other kinds of regulations that support and protect the the American people. So, when republicans talk about how terrible and wasteful government spending is ask yourself, “Who would benefit from such cuts?” Is it the billionaire donors who want to completely escape and disassociate themselves from the social contract that when they participate in it asks them to pay their fair share of taxes and live in society as socially responsible citizens, not as an elite, entitled, ultra rich sliver of the population that desires freedom from any civic responsibility?
Ask yourself, “Would getting rid of the regulations that these republicans are working to eliminate, help or hurt you and your family? Those are two very important and very easy questions that you can and should always should ask yourself when you see or hear republicans talking about slashing spending and ending regulations. Think about those regulations and about how they affect your life personally. Most often you will find that the regulations that republicans want to slash positively affect your life and improve your standard of living. Is that what you want?
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