Local-taxes

This was one of the three most influential books in my entire life, the others being the Koran and Roald Dahl's James and the Giant Peach. Kudos to Professor Harriss on turning out an economic page turner.

you'll laugh you'll cry, you won't be able to put it dow

it is hard to sum it up. two words, buy i

While certainly pricey, this set of books is absolutely the essential reference on Louisiana state tax law. Oreck does a fantastic, thorough job. Without a doubt this is the best resource available on the subject.

This book is precise,easy to understand and easy to find the topics.

I had a concern coming into this book that is was going to be pages of dull tax code jargon that kill any reading joy I might find in a book that bashes politicians. Luckily the author's wrote the book for the average Joe and left out the tax code. The basic premise of he book is that there is a special set of rules that the rich have had written into the tax code so that they do not pay the stated rates on the progressive tax system in the USA. This should not surprise most of us as it is the rich and corporations that spend the money with the politicians to get them elected, thus the back scratching has its fingers in the tax code. Now days it is hard to bring this charge up without all the 'Class Warfare' bias charges being tossed at you and this book is probably no exception. To me the authors did not seam to really be that bias, just real mad.

As an average Joe many parts of the book did make me a bit mad, just on the basic fairness point of view. They are good tidbits to have handy next time you are in a discussion with a person that pulls out the 'rich already pay most of the taxes' lines. With that said I did feel that the authors might have been reaching on some of thier complaints about corporations. Like most things it is a matter of degrees and in some parts I thought they went one or two steps over the line. My biggest complaint of the book was the number of person quote examples they used. It was nice to see two or three comments from some Senators on this or that tax bill, but the authors always seemed to use 10 ' 15. It was too much, we all know the politicians all read from the same talking points memos so to spell it out in a book using examples was overkill. Overall the book was interesting but not earth shattering.

America, Who Stole the Dream, was a WONDERFUL READ. I find myself leaning more to the right, from a political perspective, but the authors arguments are EXCELLENT at times and they definitely bring up some great points.

This book is the most well argued book I have read about the current demise of the middle class in the U.S. After reading it I would definitely have to say that I have more concern about political decisions being made in Washington as the authors illustrate that consistently the politicians don't do the right thing for the country.

The authors bring up several concerns

1.Middle class demise via outsourcing of manufacturing to lower cost areas
2.Growing disparity of wealth (the rich own more in % terms)
3.The outsourcing of the 'HIGH TECH JOBS' that are to be the savior of the country.
4.Commentary about various social programs set up and how ineffective they are.

In conclusion I would say this book was extremely well researched and I therefore give KUDOS to the authors. While I don't agree with everything they wrote I believe they have put forth an excellent piece of work.

My main contention with the book is that it focuses on the demise of manufacturing and low-end jobs, along with some high tech. The U.S. is expensive from a labor perspective. As we have outsourced much of our manufacturing we have been able to purchase products at cheaper prices in the U.S.. Imagine what some products would cost if we were paying for labor that was, in some cases, 10x higher than current wages in developing countries? NOWHERE in the book do the authors mention the BENEFIT to our standard of living because we can buy more with our dollars than we would be able to do so otherwise. In general, this book is WAY to the left so reader beware.

My background is a B.S. in Acct., an MBA in finance and current interests in economic and social policy development so I found this to be quite an interesting read.

If you are like me you might have wondered why the "tax relief" of the last twenty years never seemed to really show up in your paycheck. You might have wondered why it felt like more and more of your income seemed to go to pay sales taxes and property taxes and income taxes and fees. If you wondered about that then you are likely somewhere in the middle class or even poor. If you wondered why it seemed that way, it's because it really is that way. See, as the top marginal rates for the well to do and the rates of tax on corporations has been reduced over and over, the Federal distributions to the states and municipal governments have been cut over and over. Unfortunantly for the great unwashed masses of the middle class, the state and local governments can't just close shop and stop providing essential services so they did what they had to do. They raised state and local sales, income and property taxes in a regressive manner to make up the shortfall. But wait! There's more!

In the 80's, as the budget deficits soared beyond anyone's worst nightmare, something had to be done to mask the true size of the monster. The result? A spike in the "payroll taxes" used to pay for Social Security and Medicare! While technically "off budget" and held in trust, the shell game used these receipts to disguise the growing deficits by lumping them in with other tax revenue. Oh yeah...the wealthy don't pay this tax on the vast majority of their income.

Barlett and Steele do a very passable job of explaining the shell game that has been used to lead Americans down the primrose path while transferring an ever greater share of our nations wealth to the very few at the expense of the rest of us. Now, as we repeat the major blunders of the Reagan eras transfer of wealth to the well to do with the fiscally irresponsible Bush tax cut (if you think that there is really a surplus to pay for this thing you are in for a rude awakening), this book is a very timely read. I can't recommend it highly enough. Get a copy and find out why almost all of what you thought you knew and almost all of what our political leaders are telling you is simply wrong.

America now has the largest gap between rich and poor in the entire industrialized world. Tax policy is at least partly to blame and has accelerated the growth of that gap such that it has more than doubled in the last twenty years. Do yourself a favor by finding a copy of this book to find out why. It's much worse than I can tell you here in the words allowed to me. I think most people instinctively know the truth but they are in denial. It's ugly and it's time to face it.

As a state and local tax professional, I purchased a copy of this text to use for "in-house" training at my company. Seeing that the "Second Edition" was published this year (2004), I assumed it would be a relatively accurate text. However, in reviewing Chapter 3 ("Corporate Income/Franchise Taxes" - my area of specialization), I was dismayed to find that most of the information has not been updated for current law. As examples, the table on apportionment factor weighting hasn't been updated for changes since 1999, and the discussion of state differences in depreciation fails to address the dramatic changes that have occurred due to 2002 and 2003 federal legislation.

While the authors do present some good materials on the basics of state and local taxation, and address many of the issues that can arise, their release of a "Second Edition" that is woefully out-of-date seriously detracts from its utility in a learning environment.

Now in its second edition, State And Local Taxation: Principles And Planning is the authoritative and collaborative effort of tax experts Charles W. Swenson, Sanjay Gupta, John E. Karayan, and Joseph Neff. This outstanding informational resource is meant to be used as a professional reference or a college curriculum text. Covering tax code, hazards, loopholes, and regulations as imposed by governments (especially pertaining to cross-border transactions), State And Local Taxation is meticulously detailed and spells out the facts, principles, and requirements for both students of Economics and non-specialist general readers seeking to expertly flesh out their knowledge base with respect to all aspects of governmental taxation.