Wednesday, July 05, 2017
Death And Taxes
By Donovan Baldwin
Just to put the world in perspective. I graduated The University of West Florida (UWF), with a degree in accounting in 1973. I took many classes in humanities, math, English, accounting, finance, and economics. Of course, I took many accounting courses; beginning, intermediate, advanced. Accounting for managerial control. Cost accounting. Government accounting. All these courses, had one or two books. Economics tended to have big, heavy books. Finance tended to have small, reasonably sized text books. I carried a briefcase with all my books each quarter (we were on quarters, not semesters). Then came the quarter I had to take TAX ACCOUNTING! The texts for Tax Accounting filled my briefcase and I had to carry the books for other classes in my arms. That tells you something. Either taxes are the most important thing an accounting student has to learn...OR...wait for it...taxes are just too damn complicated. I think citizens should pay taxes to help the government do important stuff (another discussion), but, the citizen should be able to put his or her tax information on a tax return the size of a post card, and, it should take a citizen about one minute more than it takes them to gather their data, to fill in that tax return. Somebody is getting rich from complicated tax laws, and, it is not the citizen.
Just to put the world in perspective. I graduated The University of West Florida (UWF), with a degree in accounting in 1973. I took many classes in humanities, math, English, accounting, finance, and economics. Of course, I took many accounting courses; beginning, intermediate, advanced. Accounting for managerial control. Cost accounting. Government accounting. All these courses, had one or two books. Economics tended to have big, heavy books. Finance tended to have small, reasonably sized text books. I carried a briefcase with all my books each quarter (we were on quarters, not semesters). Then came the quarter I had to take TAX ACCOUNTING! The texts for Tax Accounting filled my briefcase and I had to carry the books for other classes in my arms. That tells you something. Either taxes are the most important thing an accounting student has to learn...OR...wait for it...taxes are just too damn complicated. I think citizens should pay taxes to help the government do important stuff (another discussion), but, the citizen should be able to put his or her tax information on a tax return the size of a post card, and, it should take a citizen about one minute more than it takes them to gather their data, to fill in that tax return. Somebody is getting rich from complicated tax laws, and, it is not the citizen.
Labels: accounting, article by Donovan Baldwin, donovan baldwin, tax accounting, taxes, University of West Florida, UWF
