Tax Guru-Ker$tetter Letter
Sunday, April 07, 2002
Helping Seniors
Supposedly, the GOP is trying to think of ways to make itself more popular with senior citizens. I have had the answer to that problem for a very long time.
One giant step forward for the GOP would be to honor the original agreement with Social Security participants. It was originally set up that all benefits would be free of income tax. This was supposed to balance out the fact that payments in to the SS system are not deductible, resulting in a double taxation.
Currently, because our masters in DC have no qualms about breaking promises, many people have to pay taxes on 85% of their benefits if they are considered to be "evil rich." For this issue, evil rich has been defined as AGI over $25,000 for a single person or $32,000 for a married couple. This was an outright fraudulent violation of the public trust and we have long been waiting for someone in DC to have the guts to repeal the tax on SS benefits.
KMK