Frankenstein’s code

To hear House Speaker Newt Gingrich tell it, the U.S. income tax code is a 350-million word, multi-volume “monstrosity” that stalks the countryside and tramples the hopes and dreams of hard-working Americans.

But before the speaker and the 219 Republicans who voted last week to abolish the code by 2003 take torch and pitchfork in hand, they should acknowledge their role, if not as the mad doctors who created the fiend, at least as the assisting Igors.

No question, the tax code is bloated and needlessly complex — that’s why some 60 million taxpayers each year have to hire a professional preparer. But the law did not go Gargantuan spontaneously, it was fed by lawmakers. It is not, as the House GOP would like it, the IRS tax code. It is Congress’ tax code.

The measure passed by the House (to their credit, 20 Republicans bucked leadership) abolished the existing tax code if something else is in place by (a little symbolism, please) July 4, 2002. Whether that something will be a flat tax, a national sales tax or a household pet tax (golden retrievers exempted) is anybody’s guess. The point of the deadline, says sponsor Rep. Steve Largent, “is that it makes it very, very difficult for them not to act. It does not preclude any options, any ideas or any plans.”

Two problems. First, the “them” the bill forces into action actually is Rep. Largent himself and his majority colleagues. If the party controlling Congress wants a fairer and simpler tax system, they should just get busy and invent one. Second, not wanting to preclude any options, ideas or plans — in other words, not having a clue — creates the one thing the economy of this nation and of the world does not need: uncertainty.

Anyone thinking about buying a house might now be wondering about the future of the mortgage interest deduction and having second thoughts, a wait-and-see attitude that could trickle down to everyone in the business of building and furnishing homes. Likewise, all those workers who should be setting up individual retirement accounts now have to worry about their timing. Municipal bonds, insurance, annuities, charitable contributions and anything else now getting special tax treatment are question marks. The struggling economies of Russia and Asia will not be helped if the world’s most powerful economic engine sputters in doubt.

A little doubt or uncertaintly might be a fair price to pay if there was some hope that a new tax system would be an improvement. There is little reason for such hope. The current code got to be such a mess because wealthy special interests paid their friends in Congress for the breaks they enjoy. A clean sheet of paper merely opens up a new round of wheeling and dealing.

The good news is that this is election-year gimmickry, cynical grandstanding of the first degree, and everyone knows it, especially the Senate. Everyone knows House Republicans aren’t thinking about Jan. 1, 2003, or even July 4, 2002. This is all about Nov. 3, 1998. Maybe after Election Day they’ll use their torches to shed some light on tax reform and their pitchforks to get some real work done.