Daniel J Mitchell

While Americans struggle to comply with one of the world's most complicated tax codes, it's worth noting that about one-dozen nations have adopted simple and fair flat-tax systems.Hong Kong has had a flat tax for nearly 60 years, and has gone from being one of the...

Small-business owners, farmers, investors and entrepreneurs face a good news-bad news quandary. The good news is that the death tax will disappear in 2010. If they die that year, their families will get their assets, not the IRS.The bad news is that this pernicious...

If anything's likely to boost support for the flat tax, it's the annual nightmare of tax season. Imagine junking all the paperwork the current system requires and replacing it with two simple postcard-sized forms that tax income only once and at one low rate. Imagine...

America's complicated tax system needs a complete overhaul, not minor fixes. The large role that system plays in many of the political dramas dominating the daily headlines shows why. Republicans and Democrats, for instance, are fighting over the "outsourcing" of jobs...

America's number-one enemy isn't Al Qaeda, Libya, North Korea or Cuba. It's Bermuda! At least that's what John Kerry seems to want American voters to believe. At almost every campaign stop, he attacks "Benedict Arnold corporations" that move to Bermuda. One could...

In their view, the traditional Washington career path -- a stint in government followed by a lucrative job lobbying former colleagues -- is inherently corrupt. Both candidates propose restrictions, including limits on the ability of former government officials to...

Many politicians seem to think that the answer to every alleged problem is higher taxes. Howard Dean, for instance, has said he would repeal the Bush tax cuts -- even though this would boost the average family's tax burden by nearly $2,000. This initiative sounds...

Our tax code has many ridiculous features, but the booby prize may belong to a provision that discourages companies from investing profits in America and instead encourages them to keep money overseas. It's a 35 percent tax penalty imposed on American companies that...

To get an idea of what it's like to tangle with the IRS, imagine having to fight Mike Tyson -- with both hands tied behind your back. The IRS is the most feared government agency, and with good reason. Americans who run afoul of this bureaucratic behemoth have little...

It would be easy to resent the World Trade Organization right now. Here we are, trying to get our economy to grow, and the WTO comes along and says the European Union gets to impose a $4 billion annual tax hike on American companies. This is because of a WTO ruling...

Listening to Washington policy-makers haggle over the size of President Bush's proposed tax cut -- $350 billion over the next decade? $550 billion? $726 billion? -- you would think nothing matters much beyond the price tag.Just as important, though, is the type of tax...

It's never fun to admit failure. But Russia's 13 percent flat tax forces me to confess a certain degree of incompetence. For 10 years, I've been working in Washington to replace our convoluted tax code with a simple and fair flat tax. But as every taxpayer can attest,...

Economic growth occurs when people work more, save more, and invest more. These are the behaviors that increase national income and boost the nation's wealth. People do not produce more simply because the government has a balanced budget. Nor do they increase their...

President George W. Bush has proposed that the double taxation of dividends be eliminated. Under his plan, businesses would continue to pay tax on corporate income, but individual stockholders no longer would have to pay a second layer of tax on that income when it is...

President Bush's critics reacted in predictably uniform fashion to his latest economic proposal: Playing the class-warfare card.Good luck making that charge stick. America isn't France. The politics of hate-and-envy doesn't resonate here like it does in Europe. We...