October 16th Presidential Debate Opinions

[winex]

1)  What is he planning to cut?  What simplification is he talking about?  How is "simplification" going to save $300 billion? 

2)  To use the 24% number is extremely misleading because it accounts for the stimulus and bailouts.  Unless you believe that the US is going to go into another depression threat and need additional stimulus, the 24% is not going to continue anyways.  Also, Obama actually put war spending back into the budget where as Bush kept using "off-the-books" money to fund the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
http://www.factcheck.org/2012/06/obamas-spending-inferno-or-not/

3)  What deductions are we talking about?  He already took off charitable donations, health care deductions, and home mortgage from the table.  Even if he does put those on the table, they would affect the middle class a lot more than the relatively wealthy considering most of those deductions are phased out for high income earners anyways.

4)  Who cares about historical norms?  Republicans are the ones who talk about not "borrowing" money from China to fund things we don't need.  Why is an increase in the military budget necessary?

5)  Obama has already sent to Congress a jobs bill that focuses on infrastructure building, hiring more teachers, investment in green jobs/industry, as well as tax incentives for re-training and for companies to keep jobs in the US.
http://www.npr.org/2012/10/08/162400400/obamas-jobs-plan-focuses-on-federal-investment

IrvineCommuter> 1)  What is he planning to cut?  What simplification is he talking about?  How is "simplification" going to save $300 billion? 

3 questions in point number 1

Romney has already outlined principles for what should and what shouldn't be a function of government.  He has talked about whether or not something is worth borrowing money from the Chinese. (Personally I would prefer that he defers to the Constitution)  Some examples he has mentioned are PBS.  He has talked about replacing a lot of spending on education with block grants to the states, and other issues.  If you want to see his positions, I suggest you stop watching MS-NBC and read what Mitt Romney has actually said about his plans on his website.  The information is out there, you just have to quit denying that it is public information.

For tax simplification, Romney has talked about eliminating numerous deductions and loopholes and having a flatter tax system with lower rates.  Does he have actual legislation ready to go through Congress?  Of course not, he is a private citizen and the makeup of the House and Senate is in flux right now.  What he does have are broad principles and a willingness to work with congress to eliminate our horrid tax system.

The $300 billion I referred to (that I wish Mitt would mention more often) is the estimated amount of money spent annually by individuals and businesses each and every year attempting to comply with a tax code that exceeds 73,000 pages.  Simplify the tax code and you return that money to the people where it can be used for more productive purposes WITHOUT costing the government a penny of revenue.

I am anxiously awaiting your answer on why we shouldn't simplify our tax system and quit wasting so much time and money on a system that is unworkable.

IrvineCommuter> >2)  To use the 24% number is extremely misleading because it accounts for the stimulus and bailouts.  Unless you believe that the US is going to go into another depression threat and need additional stimulus, the 24% is not going to continue anyways.  Also, Obama actually put war spending back into the budget where as Bush kept using "off-the-books" money to fund the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Actually you are wrong.  The stimulous/pay-off to Obama supporters wound down in 2010.  The 24% of GDP spending number is current.  20% is the historical post World War II and pre Obama average for Federal spending.
http://www.factcheck.org/2012/06/obamas-spending-inferno-or-not/

Your link is nothing but propaganda.  If given the ability to enact his will, the "stimulus" is permanent.  Spending hasn't gone down since the "stimulus" program wound down.

IrvineHomeowner>3)  What deductions are we talking about?  He already took off charitable donations, health care deductions, and home mortgage from the table.  Even if he does put those on the table, they would affect the middle class a lot more than the relatively wealthy considering most of those deductions are phased out for high income earners anyways.

Again, go to www.mittromney.com , it's all detailed there for you





IrvineHomeowner>4)  Who cares about historical norms?  Republicans are the ones who talk about not "borrowing" money from China to fund things we don't need.  Why is an increase in the military budget necessary?


Because national defense is one area of government spending that is an enumerated power of the Federal government as defined by the Constitution.  I just did a quick check and my copy of the Constitution doesn't contain the words "Big Bird".  If it is not in the Constitution, the Feds aren't allowed to engage in that activity.


IrvineOwner>5)  Obama has already sent to Congress a jobs bill that focuses on infrastructure building, hiring more teachers, investment in green jobs/industry, as well as tax incentives for re-training and for companies to keep jobs in the US.
http://www.npr.org/2012/10/08/162400400/obamas-jobs-plan-focuses-on-federal-investment
[/quote]

I didn't ask if Obama planned on continuing to buy off his political supporters.  We already know the answer to that.  I did ask what his agenda for a second term is.  Are you telling me that his only plans are to continue trying to pass a failed bill in the name of crony socialism?

 

[winex]

That's because Romney does not have anything new to say and won't get specific.

You misspelled Obama

 

[qwerty]

The $300 billion I referred to (that I wish Mitt would mention more often) is the estimated amount of money spent annually by individuals and businesses each and every year attempting to comply with a tax code that exceeds 73,000 pages.  Simplify the tax code and you return that money to the people where it can be used for more productive purposes WITHOUT costing the government a penny of revenue.

IrvineHomeowner>4)  Who cares about historical norms?  Republicans are the ones who talk about not "borrowing" money from China to fund things we don't need.  Why is an increase in the military budget necessary?


Because national defense is one area of government spending that is an enumerated power of the Federal government as defined by the Constitution.  I just did a quick check and my copy of the Constitution doesn't contain the words "Big Bird".  If it is not in the Constitution, the Feds aren't allowed to engage in that activity.

winex - you continue to point out the $300B in money spent on compliance - isnt that 300B going to CPA/Tax/Consulting firms? Isnt that 300B already creating jobs? How is it going to be put to more productive use? If the companies use it to create more jobs in their industries dont the jobs go down at the CPA/Tax Consulting firms resulting in somewhat of a zero sum game in job growth?

Also i was curious to see your answer on why the increase in DOD spending was necessary - but it looks like you didnt really answer the question? i have to agree with IHO - just because it was a certain % of spending in the past, it does not mean it needs to stay that way.  if you think about it, if you try to just try to peg DOD spending as a % of GDP - assuming that GDP were to grow at 4% a year, does it really make sense to continue to peg DOD spending at a % of GDP? are there more people to protect? did the US borders that the DOD protects gets bigger?

 

[irvinehomeowner]

Just to be clear... it's Irvinecommuter with all those counterpoints... not me... IHO isn't as versed in politics as everyone else is... I only know about Universal DonutCare.

 

[changm55]

honestly we should all be up in arms with DOD spending... we had to borrow money for war in iraq and afghan =_=... so does this mean our annual DOD spending only accounts for maintaining our troops/arsenal??? lol so for every future conflict thats larger than a skirmish, we will need to borrow or come up with additional money to fund? what if our opponent actually has a modern army? makes no sense how we dont even got no rainy day fund in the event of potential armed conflict... besides the current fall back plan like hurry call the fed to print more money~

 

[winex]

Just to be clear... it's Irvinecommuter with all those counterpoints... not me... IHO isn't as versed in politics as everyone else is... I only know about Universal DonutCare.

Sorry about that.  No offense was intended.  I was trying to answer multiple questions from one post and manually typing in the (wrong) poster to make my response easier to read.

 

[winex]

winex - you continue to point out the $300B in money spent on compliance - isnt that 300B going to CPA/Tax/Consulting firms? Isnt that 300B already creating jobs? How is it going to be put to more productive use? If the companies use it to create more jobs in their industries dont the jobs go down at the CPA/Tax Consulting firms resulting in somewhat of a zero sum game in job growth?

Also i was curious to see your answer on why the increase in DOD spending was necessary - but it looks like you didnt really answer the question? i have to agree with IHO - just because it was a certain % of spending in the past, it does not mean it needs to stay that way.  if you think about it, if you try to just try to peg DOD spending as a % of GDP - assuming that GDP were to grow at 4% a year, does it really make sense to continue to peg DOD spending at a % of GDP? are there more people to protect? did the US borders that the DOD protects gets bigger?

Wow, I am kind of surprised by your first question.  I guess I am guilty of assuming that economic literacy is more widespread than it actually is.  Of course if that was the case, our country would have followed different policies over the past 4 years.  Instead the middle class has been buried by the policies of the Obama administration. (If you don't believe me, listen to this guy - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kXYFAtQsIvE&feature=related )

Anyway, yes there are people who make a living off of our 73,000 page tax code.  These people exist in both private industry and in the government itself.  (Yet another savings from tax simplification involves downsizing the IRS).  And tax simplification would require these people to find a new way to earn a living.

But we are not talking about a zero sum game here.

I could find the numbers if someone is interested, but a large amount of the costs of tax compliance are born by businesses.  Accountants and lawyers aren't free, and any cost born by business has to be passed on to customers of that business. 

Repeat after me "Tax compliance raises the cost of goods and services.  As a result consumers (business and private) of those goods and services have less disposable income."  If the good or service being offered by a business is subject to price elasticity of demand, it also means that the higher price reduces demand.  This unproductive use of resources (money spent on tax compliant) has a negative impact on growth of the business, and therefore reduces the size of its workforce.

Outside of that, the tangled nature of our tax code causes money to be mal-invested in attempts to reduce tax liability.  If people and business owners didn't have to try to game the system, their resources could be used to more productive uses.

You also have to consider the impact of uncertainty on the economy.  Not only can no one accurately say what tax rates are going to look like 2 1/2 months from now (taxes on dividend income could be 43.9% under Obama, 15% under current law, or 0% for people earning less than $200k, or 15% for people earning more than $200k under Romney's proposal), but even without the extreme divergence in tax rates and law in our immediate future, the federal tax code grew from 1.4 million words to 3.8 million words between 2001 and 2011.

Between 1986 and 2005, Congress passed a total of 14,400 amendments to the tax code.  That is an average of 2.9 changes per day for the entire 19 year period.

How on earth can any individual or business make concrete plans in an environment like that?  What is the impact of uncertainty on the economy.


As for defense spending, depending on the quality of your response to this post I will decide whether or not to educate you on that topic.  Informed responses take time to formulate, and I don't want to mal-invest my own time.

 

[Irvinecommuter]

Winex:  I won't repost your response as it is too long.

1)  I don't listen or watch MSNBC...I have been to his website and paid close to attention to what both Ryan and him have been saying.  In the end, he has said nothing.  He admitted as much by stating that it's more of a big idea thing and the details will come later.  The Constitution thing is so silly to me.  The Constitution was written 1789 and based largely in the idea of an agrian society where slavery and indentured servants were okay.  Move to the 21st century and deal with issues now and not even imagined by the "Founding Fathers".

He has not identified a single deduction he would cut!  He has talked about maybe a cap on deductions but there is nothing there.  As Jon Stewart said, what is he...some sort of wizard?

$300 billion I referred to (that I wish Mitt would mention more often) is the estimated amount of money spent annually by individuals and businesses each and every year attempting to comply with a tax code that exceeds 73,000 pages.

 

How does that shrink the deficit?  That's private money going to other private industry and already part of the economy. 

2)  My link is propaganda?  It's a non-partisan reputable factchecking site.  Where are your facts?

3)  So we should spend because you think supporting a bloated and out of date military that still thinks that we are in the cold war and should be ready to fight two front wars at any given time is okay but funding PBS and food stamps are not. 

4)  Why is that plan "buying off" supporters, apparently Romney's wishlist is not an attempt to "buy" voters.  I believe in infrastructure spending...our infrastructure is a joke compared to the rest of the world.  Most of the road were built in the 1930-1950s and we don't even have a high speed rail system of significance.  The US cannot look at the jobs that countries like China took because they have no labor or environmental laws to deal with.  That race to the bottom is a fool's game and the US will never win.  US has to focus of developing industries that require high levels of skills and education to power its economy. 

 

[irvinehomeowner]

I think that even if the tax code were simplified, rich individuals and businesses would still try to "game the system".  Simplifying the tax code doesn't exactly change the tricks that companies use to report income.

I am also not of the belief that if the cost of doing business were to go down because of tax simplification, that would proportionately translate into a same reduction of costs for goods and services.

 

[qwerty]

winex - you continue to point out the $300B in money spent on compliance - isnt that 300B going to CPA/Tax/Consulting firms? Isnt that 300B already creating jobs? How is it going to be put to more productive use? If the companies use it to create more jobs in their industries dont the jobs go down at the CPA/Tax Consulting firms resulting in somewhat of a zero sum game in job growth?

Also i was curious to see your answer on why the increase in DOD spending was necessary - but it looks like you didnt really answer the question? i have to agree with IHO - just because it was a certain % of spending in the past, it does not mean it needs to stay that way.  if you think about it, if you try to just try to peg DOD spending as a % of GDP - assuming that GDP were to grow at 4% a year, does it really make sense to continue to peg DOD spending at a % of GDP? are there more people to protect? did the US borders that the DOD protects gets bigger?

Wow, I am kind of surprised by your first question.  I guess I am guilty of assuming that economic literacy is more widespread than it actually is.  Of course if that was the case, our country would have followed different policies over the past 4 years.  Instead the middle class has been buried by the policies of the Obama administration. (If you don't believe me, listen to this guy - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kXYFAtQsIvE&feature=related )

Anyway, yes there are people who make a living off of our 73,000 page tax code.  These people exist in both private industry and in the government itself.  (Yet another savings from tax simplification involves downsizing the IRS).  And tax simplification would require these people to find a new way to earn a living.

But we are not talking about a zero sum game here.

I could find the numbers if someone is interested, but a large amount of the costs of tax compliance are born by businesses.  Accountants and lawyers aren't free, and any cost born by business has to be passed on to customers of that business. 

Repeat after me "Tax compliance raises the cost of goods and services.  As a result consumers (business and private) of those goods and services have less disposable income."  If the good or service being offered by a business is subject to price elasticity of demand, it also means that the higher price reduces demand.  This unproductive use of resources (money spent on tax compliant) has a negative impact on growth of the business, and therefore reduces the size of its workforce.

Outside of that, the tangled nature of our tax code causes money to be mal-invested in attempts to reduce tax liability.  If people and business owners didn't have to try to game the system, their resources could be used to more productive uses.

You also have to consider the impact of uncertainty on the economy.  Not only can no one accurately say what tax rates are going to look like 2 1/2 months from now (taxes on dividend income could be 43.9% under Obama, 15% under current law, or 0% for people earning less than $200k, or 15% for people earning more than $200k under Romney's proposal), but even without the extreme divergence in tax rates and law in our immediate future, the federal tax code grew from 1.4 million words to 3.8 million words between 2001 and 2011.

Between 1986 and 2005, Congress passed a total of 14,400 amendments to the tax code.  That is an average of 2.9 changes per day for the entire 19 year period.

How on earth can any individual or business make concrete plans in an environment like that?  What is the impact of uncertainty on the economy.


As for defense spending, depending on the quality of your response to this post I will decide whether or not to educate you on that topic.  Informed responses take time to formulate, and I don't want to mal-invest my own time.

relax winex - no need to be the internet tough guy calling people out on their intelligence. not everyone is a political/economic genius like you (im kidding, you seem to think so highly of yourself that i want to clarify so you dont think im actually paying you a compliment). i was just asking a simple question - i didnt think it was insulting to you or can the great winex not be questioned at all? it is as if you try to show off your political prowess to make up for your insecurities - just relax, it is an internet forum after all.

i did stay at a holiday inn express last night so i am feeling a little smarter than usual. ill try to formulate a response that would be worthy of you responding the the DOD spending question. the response is actually quite simple though so we will see.  irvine commuter touched on it in his response above actually. 

here we go - if i am the economy and i take $300B in wages from one group (which reduces this groups demand now) and pass it on to another group in the form of lower priced products (which increases this groups demand), i am just taking money from one pocket and putting in the other. You somehow neglect to forget the demand being generated by the $300B in wages from accountants/lawyers.  If you take 300B from them, the demand they generated by the accountant/lawyers goes away so demand stays the same and the supply side doesnt change. Am i missing something?  comments like yours are what happens when you just regurgitate information you read somewhere else without actually understanding the principles of economics.

And spare me the rhetoric about the impact taxes has on companies. I work at a public company and had many public companies as clients.  I can say that in every case the company's business strategy revolved around growing the business and making money, and of course they employed tax strategies to keep more of their money but you need to make money first before you even have to worry about paying taxes. Paying taxes is a good problem to have - means your making some cash money.  The R&D credit for example, while it expired at the end of 2011, i would wager that the majority of companies spent the same amount (or more) on R&D because it has been reinstated retroactively for the longest time now and they know that it will be reinstated in 2013.  are you going to tell me that companies did no R&D because of the tax uncertainty? give me a break.

im ready for my next economics lesson!

 

[qwerty]

3)  So we should spend because you think supporting a bloated and out of date military that still thinks that we are in the cold war and should be ready to fight two front wars at any given time is okay but funding PBS and food stamps are not. 

what part of Winex's response did you not understand? It is enumerated in the constitution! the government can spend as much as it wants on defense 

 

[qwerty]

Repeat after me "Tax compliance raises the cost of goods and services.  As a result consumers (business and private) of those goods and services have less disposable income."  If the good or service being offered by a business is subject to price elasticity of demand, it also means that the higher price reduces demand.  This unproductive use of resources (money spent on tax compliant) has a negative impact on growth of the business, and therefore reduces the size of its workforce.

real economic growth comes from efficiencies from technological advancements/increased productivity which reduces the costs of goods sold so the demand is driven up to the population/world as a whole, real economic growth does not come from taking $300B from one group and giving to another.

 

[winex]

Repeat after me "Tax compliance raises the cost of goods and services.  As a result consumers (business and private) of those goods and services have less disposable income."  If the good or service being offered by a business is subject to price elasticity of demand, it also means that the higher price reduces demand.  This unproductive use of resources (money spent on tax compliant) has a negative impact on growth of the business, and therefore reduces the size of its workforce.

real economic growth comes from efficiencies from technological advancements/increased productivity which reduces the costs of goods sold so the demand is driven up to the population/world as a whole, real economic growth does not come from taking $300B from one group and giving to another.

Again, the conservative estimate of the cost of tax compliance is $300 billion a year.  Can you tell me how spending time filling out tax forms and/or paying accounts and tax lawyers to fill out tax forms or find strategies to avoid taxes increases productivity or advances technology?

It is not hard to make the case that allowing people to avoid wasting this time and money can increase productivity.  I just don't see how it is possible to make the counter argument.

 

[winex]

The Constitution thing is so silly to me.  The Constitution was written 1789 and based largely in the idea of an agrian society where slavery and indentured servants were okay.  Move to the 21st century and deal with issues now and not even imagined by the "Founding Fathers".

As Jon Stewart said, what is he...some sort of wizard?

I stripped out all but the relevant parts of your post.  If you think the "Constitution thing is silly" and you get your news from Jon Stewart, there really is no point in trying to educate you.  Or put another way, "Never try to teach a pig to sing. It wastes your time, and it annoys the pig."

On that note, I'll stop wasting my time.

 

[qwerty]

Repeat after me "Tax compliance raises the cost of goods and services.  As a result consumers (business and private) of those goods and services have less disposable income."  If the good or service being offered by a business is subject to price elasticity of demand, it also means that the higher price reduces demand.  This unproductive use of resources (money spent on tax compliant) has a negative impact on growth of the business, and therefore reduces the size of its workforce.

real economic growth comes from efficiencies from technological advancements/increased productivity which reduces the costs of goods sold so the demand is driven up to the population/world as a whole, real economic growth does not come from taking $300B from one group and giving to another.

Again, the conservative estimate of the cost of tax compliance is $300 billion a year.  Can you tell me how spending time filling out tax forms and/or paying accounts and tax lawyers to fill out tax forms or find strategies to avoid taxes increases productivity or advances technology?

It is not hard to make the case that allowing people to avoid wasting this time and money can increase productivity.  I just don't see how it is possible to make the counter argument.

you are an absolute idiot - you come talking this big game as some econ genius (your lower cost of products increases demand BS, without realizing demand actually stays the same), i explain to you why you are wrong then you just ignore the fact - typical politician move, no wonder you know so much useless political stuff. just admit you were wrong.  i would have admitted i was wrong.  hell, i still may be wrong but you havent convinced me otherwise.  i was really looking forward to learning more econ from you winex, im a bit disappointed.

even if the tax code were simplified you still need the accountants/lawyers, so you will never realize anything close to the $300B in savings, you think the admin assistant will be able to fill out the tax returns due to a simplified tax code.  You dont get it - the $300B is already in the economy (as irvine commute also pointed out). I was expecting more from you winex, or put another way, knowing a lot of facts, doesnt make you smart.

On that note, I'll stop wasting my time.

 

[winex]

Repeat after me "Tax compliance raises the cost of goods and services.  As a result consumers (business and private) of those goods and services have less disposable income."  If the good or service being offered by a business is subject to price elasticity of demand, it also means that the higher price reduces demand.  This unproductive use of resources (money spent on tax compliant) has a negative impact on growth of the business, and therefore reduces the size of its workforce.

real economic growth comes from efficiencies from technological advancements/increased productivity which reduces the costs of goods sold so the demand is driven up to the population/world as a whole, real economic growth does not come from taking $300B from one group and giving to another.

Again, the conservative estimate of the cost of tax compliance is $300 billion a year.  Can you tell me how spending time filling out tax forms and/or paying accounts and tax lawyers to fill out tax forms or find strategies to avoid taxes increases productivity or advances technology?

It is not hard to make the case that allowing people to avoid wasting this time and money can increase productivity.  I just don't see how it is possible to make the counter argument.

you are an absolute idiot - you come talking this big game as some econ genius (your lower cost of products increases demand BS, without realizing demand actually stays the same), i explain to you why you are wrong then you just ignore the fact - typical politician move, no wonder you know so much useless political stuff. just admit you were wrong.  i would have admitted i was wrong.  hell, i still may be wrong but you havent convinced me otherwise.  i was really looking forward to learning more econ from you winex, im a bit disappointed.

even if the tax code were simplified you still need the accountants/lawyers, so you will never realize anything close to the $300B in savings, you think the admin assistant will be able to fill out the tax returns due to a simplified tax code.  You dont get it - the $300B is already in the economy (as irvine commute also pointed out). I was expecting more from you winex, or put another way, knowing a lot of facts, doesnt make you smart.

On that note, I'll stop wasting my time.

You know Qwerty, it doesn't matter whether you try to act in a condescending manner, or if you act like a blowhard.  It won't change the facts.  And the facts are that I stated some very basic economic concepts that are apparently foreign to you.

In the first post that was a statement of the obvious, I mentioned Price Elasticity of Demand and the impact on demand for certain goods and services.  Here is a link for you on the topic:
http://lmgtfy.com/?q=price+elasticity+of+demand

As far as the impact of the cost of tax compliance on the economy, you don't need to be an "economic genius" to understand the concept.  You don't even need to take an Economics 101 course.  You could simply look on Wikipedia and find the following:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tax#Cost_of_compliance

From that link:
[bold]
Deadweight costs of taxation

In the absence of negative externalities, the introduction of taxes into a market reduces economic efficiency by causing deadweight loss. In a competitive market the price of a particular economic good adjusts to ensure that all trades which benefit both the buyer and the seller of a good occur. The introduction of a tax causes the price received by the seller to be less than the cost to the buyer by the amount of the tax. This causes fewer transactions to occur, which reduces economic welfare; the individuals or businesses involved are less well off than before the tax. The tax burden and the amount of deadweight cost is dependent on the elasticity of supply and demand for the good taxed.[/bold]

You can either use the information from the Wikipedia link to stimulate more research on your end, or I guess if you are totally incapable of admitting that you are wrong you can always change what Wikipedia has to say on the topic. 

But regardless of what you do,  facts are facts and your continued denial won't change them.

 

[qwerty]

What is that saying - you can't argue with stupid and you can't reason with crazy. We will just agree to disagree.

 

[changm55]

I pick (C) Gary Johnson.

lol are u joking or serious? i think im gonna actually do it hahaha

 

[qwerty]

Winex - it is right there in your own link  - http://lmgtfy.com/?q=price+elasticity+of+demand    - i like that lmgtfy thing by the way.

"Price elasticity of demand (PED or Ed) is a measure used in economics to show the responsiveness, or elasticity, of the quantity demanded of a good or service to a change in its price. More precisely, it gives the percentage change in quantity demanded in response to a one percent change in price (holding constant all the other determinants of demand, such as income)."

this is what i am saying about you just regurgitating info and not understanding the principles. what you are saying is correct, if you left the $300B in income for the accountants/lawyers, however, since you are removing the $300B in income from the accountants/lawyers you are reducing income/demand by the $300B and therefore your statement is not accurate.

 

[winex]

What is that saying - you can't argue with stupid and you can't reason with crazy. We will just agree to disagree.

In an earlier post in this thread, you said "i would have admitted i was wrong." when trying to say that I was wrong for saying that tax compliance with a hopeless complex tax code hurts the US economy.  I have provided links that explain the concept of Price Elasticity of Demand and Deadweight costs of taxation. 

Had you bothered to read just 3 simple paragraphs from the link I provided, you would have seen the following 3 sentences:

Perverse incentives

"Complexity of the tax code in developed economies offer perverse tax incentives. The more details of tax policy there are, the more opportunities for legal tax avoidance and illegal tax evasion. These not only result in lost revenue, but involve additional costs: for instance, payments made for tax advice are essentially deadweight costs because they add no wealth to the economy."

While different schools of thought (Keynesian versus the Austrian school of economics advocated by Hayek and von Mises) offer different prescriptions for government to follow to maximize realization of economic potential, NO ONE who understands the basics of economics argues with concepts like Price Elasticity, Deadweight costs, or Comparative and Competitive advantage for that matter.  But Comparative and Competitive advantage is a subject for another political/economic argument.

Saying that don't believe in Price Elasticity of Demand or Deadweight costs of taxation is like saying that you don't believe in gravity if the topic were physics.  While it is amusing to hear someone try to argue against basic facts, it really does say a lot about you. (Not much of what it says is good).  Of course those statements are only reinforced by you wanting to change the subject instead of admitting you are wrong as you claimed that you would do earlier.