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Tax Free 2000: The Rebirth of American Liberty

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TAX FREE 2000
by Dr. Murray Sabrin

The title of this book may seem to date its contents and possibly its usefulness. However the issue of taxation has always been an important part of American politics, and citizens are always looking for new solutions. If you believe in radically scaling back the government, you will probably like this book. If you believe that taxes are a necessary evil that ultimately improves the lives of American citizens, you probably won't. I'm a little surprised that there haven't been more recent reviews for this book since Dr. Sabrin is currently running for Frank Lautenberg's New Jersey seat in the U.S. Senate.

Before he really goes into his own ideas, Sabrin sets the scene with some historic deelopments in economic history, including a nice history of the Federal Income Tax. This chapter alone is worth the price of the book. Like many Americans, Sabrin believes that the income tax should be abolished for both practical and moral reasons. He is more radical than most conservatives however in that he is also against property taxes, sales taxes, consumption taxes and value added taxes! He lists the down-sides to each of these proposals and why he is opposed to them. It would be interesting to hear his opinions on the recently proposed "Fair Tax".

You are probably wondering how Dr. Sabrin would like to fund the government since he doesn't believe that the current methods are suitable. In order to understand this, you have to know what he thinks the role of government should be, and how it should be changed. Here he gives brief histories of funding public education, welfare, libraries and parks, public housing, social security, medicare and medicaid. Then he gives reasons why each of these should be drastically reduced or phased out altogether. He certainly doesn't beat around the bush about it either: "There is no such thing as a positive entitlement. U.S. citizens- and non-citizens- do not have a right to food, clothing, shelter, education, medical care, welfare, etc. People have a right to pursue these objectives but no one is morally obligated to provide them to anyone" (page 153). He points out that the majority of the federal budget goes to funding three things: national defense, social security and medicare/medicaid. This is as true today as it was in 1995 when the book was written. Obviously with less programs to fund, there will be less of a need for taxes.

Dr. Sabrin concedes that national defense is an essential function of the government and needs to be funded. I must say this is one of the more unusual sections of the book. What he proposes is a graduated fee determined by a citizen's income bracket. The Defense Department could be contacted in order to determine whether or not a citizen had paid their fee. "Anyone not paying his share could be ostracized, not hired or even fired" (page 183). Sabrin points out that in the past, people have given voluntarily to support military efforts and may even give more than their expected share.

There are two other sections of the book. One is a chapter on the workings of the Federal Reserve system and its corresponding dollar inflation. The last chapter is an outline of how to downsize the government, basically a summary of the rest of the book.

Regardless of whether or not you agree with his more radical ideas, this book does a good job of explaining how government funding works. I would recommend it to anyone who is serious about cutting (not reducing) taxes.

In the interests of disclosure, Dr. Sabrin was a professor of mine in college, and an excellent professor he was. However, if I knew then what I knew now, I would have asked Dr Sabrin a few questions. First, how he could make the argument (very briefly), that we should send people back to where they "came from." I should say, it has been some time since I read his book, and this is not a central theme in this book, but the fact that it's even put out there is disturbing. Secondly, with the regressive tax structure the U.S. already has, how could he possibly argue that income tax should be repealed. It is very easy to see who will get the windfall should such a thing occur - the more money you have, the less you'd pay. Sales taxes would skyrocket (since poorer people use a much higher proportion of their income to buy things, it stands to reason that they will pay quite a higher proportion of their income in taxes), as would property taxes, which, of course, corporations would find ways around paying, leaving your average homeowner to pay the bulk of these taxes. Dr. Sabin ran for governor of New Jersey a few years back on the Libertarian ticket. Libertarians and conservatives would argue that this will encourage saving, but tell that to the family struggling to pay for basic needs like clothing (taxed in many states already), etc. Rather than structuring the tax system as such, we need to close up the loopholes that allow corporations to pay nothing in taxes while forcing you or I to pick up their slack. How can we disallow a tax on dividends or estates? Oh, well, it's double-taxation, they would argue. However, sales taxes are a double tax - our income has already been taxed, why do we have to pay another tax if dividends don't get taxed? Warren Buffett himself has pointed to the dopiness of this - he'd wind up paying 3% of his income in taxes while his secretary paid 30% of hers.