Inequities in Tax Proposals

Russell Korobkin’s proposal to tax married people as though they were single is a cure worse than the disease (Commentary, July 24). As he gently concedes, taxing married individuals as though they were single would merely replace one injustice with another. If the Joneses earn $60,000 a year through the wife’s job alone, while the Smiths next door earn $30,000 each, why should the Joneses pay more tax on exactly the same income?

There is another solution, however, which would solve both problems: eliminate the graduated tax rate. If we taxed all income at the same rate, married couples would pay the same tax as similarly situated single couples, and single-income families would pay the same tax as their dual-income counterparts. The problem is that everyone seems to want a progressive tax, and they want to be fair to married/single people, and they want a family’s tax liability to be based on family earnings. Pick two.

JEFF BISHOP

Culver City

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* President Clinton should veto the marriage tax bill, which is nothing more than a shameless attempt at a tax cut. Why do we need a tax cut now? To jump-start the economy? Should we be giving money away based on budgets that won’t produce real dollars until well in the future? A tax cut when we have over $6 trillion in debt, pay $200 billion annually in interest and a Medicaid program that needs repair?

When these problems are taken care of with real dollars and not projected moneys, then by all means, show me the refund! Until then, show me some fiscal responsibility and stop trying to buy my vote with my money.

DOUG HALL

Culver City

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* Re the elimination of the estate tax: Do the majority of people know there is a provision to end the stepped-up basis for capital gains? That means those who would normally not benefit from the ending of estate taxes (heirs of couples leaving less than $2 million) would find their heirs paying taxes on all their capital gains that would presently be excluded.

That means that the heirs of most of us who have seen our investments increase in value would be paying a tax that would otherwise be excluded, while the multimillionaires would escape the greatest portion of theirs.

AL YABLON

Oxnard