Charles and Kathleen Moore are about to have their day in the Supreme Court over a $15,000 tax bill they contend is unconstitutional.
The couple from Redmond, Washington, claim they had to pay the money because of their investment in an Indian company from which, as Charles Moore, 62, said in a sworn statement, they “have never received a distribution, dividend, or other payment.”
But significant parts of the story they have told to reach this point seem at odds with public records.
The Moores are the public face of a high court case backed by business and conservative political interests that could call into question other parts of the U.S. tax code and rule out a much-discussed but never-enacted tax on wealth. The case is set for arguments on Dec. 5.
Cool, I’ve never received a distribution, dividend, or other payment just from owning my house. Are my property taxes unconstitutional too?
That’s absolutely a goal of many Republicans.
In Texas there was a guy running for governor in the primaries last cycle with “Eliminate Property Taxes” as the central message of his campaign.
The thing about property taxes is they go to municipal governments, counties, and schools. Lots of cities have laws protecting water, trees, workers, etc that the Republicans hate. By eliminating property taxes, they could gut municipal governments in Democratic areas and public schools.
But what if I want my kids in private school, drink bottled water, live in a rural mansion and don’t care about workers?
…I hope the /s isn’t needed…
Local property taxes are a way to assess your share of tax burden based on something approximating your share of enjoyment of what’s provided by those tax dollars. I.e., by owning property somewhere, you benefit from that location’s fire fighters, police, roads, etc. Investment in a foreign property would have nothing to do with consumption of local government services/infrastructure.
The purpose of it doesn’t really determine whether or not the taxing authority has the authority to levy tax or not. This is all a fight to try to stop taxation of capital until/unless it is sold,at which point capital gains taxes apply. If it’s unconstitutional to tax that equity in a foreign property/enterprise solely because it isn’t income (distribution, dividend, other payment) then I don’t see how it would be constitutional to tax a stake or equity in real estate.
Of course, I’m being slightly facetious here. Obviously we have a long history of taxing property, so I don’t see how logically this tax is unconstitutional either. In the same vein, the US also taxes foreign income that has no real nexus in the US, so if that’s fine I fail to see how they can’t tax a citizen’s foreign assets.
On that point I’ll have to grudgingly agree with what I assume is the conservative position. I see no moral or legal basis for a county to tax activities that take place outside their jurisdiction. The citizenship of the people involved shouldn’t change that, but according to the US (and, as far as I know, no other county), it does. I generally see any conservative legal victory as a setback, but if this case some stops the practice of taxing US citizens living abroad, I’ll consider it a silver lining.
Bold of you to think they won’t say yes.
Property tax is state and local, IRS is federal.
Different constitutions