Here's Larry Elder on marriage and gay marriage, proposing King Solomon's solution: okay, we'll cut the baby in half! One side wants gay marriage, the other side wants no gay marriage -- let's have no marriage at all!
I have begun to think that this is the only consistent position for the supporters of current marriage rules to take. Certainly I would expect that if same-sex marriage becomes state-sanctioned, religious groups who strongly oppose same-sex marriage will refuse to perform civil marriages. Perhaps they won't -- perhaps, like the case of rubella vaccine, made possible by tissue taken from an aborted fetus, the church will weasel and take both positions, claiming that gay marriage is wrong but still acting for the state in certifying opposite-sex marriages.
Certainly there is a political risk in refusing to conduct civil marriages: many people may leave the church over it. (But haven't they left already?)
I was working on our taxes the other night and I had some loose thoughts about campaign finance and the difference between the American and Canadian systems.
But first, why was I working on our taxes in February when they're not due until April 30th?
Because employers have to file the T4 summary form (documenting all payroll taxes paid for all employees) by February 29, and we are technically an employer -- at least, our corporation is. I had better records this year, so I was able to set up what I needed in about half an hour. It then took me nearly an hour to file with Revenue Canada's T4 Web Forms. Much of the time was spent getting my access code issued (never received one in the mail) and then re-issued ("Hmmm... that does seem to be your access code. And you can't log in with it? I'll just issue you a new one.")
That was Monday. Tuesday, Revenue Canada printed me up a "TAX DEDUCTION, CANADA PENSION PLAN AND EMPLOYMENT INSURANCE DISCREPANCY NOTICE" which I received in today's mail, but it's OK. I was prepared for it. Back in January I nearly had a heart attack when I noticed that the total amount that we should have collected for the year was different from the amount that Revenue Canada reports is in our payroll tax account, by somewhat over two thousand dollars.
The difference is in our favor -- we overpaid, which is actually worse than if we had underpaid. If we had underpaid, Revenue Canada would have just charged us some interest and that would be that. But since we overpaid, they want to know why.
And the reason why is that in 2002, I didn't keep very good records, and we found ourselves having underpaid our payroll taxes by rather a lot. And therefore owing rather a lot plus interest, in April of all times, and therefore having to pay rather a lot all at once. Then for some reason, Revenue Canada took our arrears payment for 2002 and interpreted it as a tax payment for 2003, and then they decided that our monthly payroll tax payment for 2003 was rather a lot and sent us a few bills for that amount. This all took a while to straighten out, and in the end we had overpaid 2002 by an amount of money which is somewhat over two thousand dollars, which was subsequently (June 18th if you must know) transferred to 2003. And this is what Revenue Canada wants to know about now.
Anyway, back to why I was doing our personal taxes. One of the products of the T4 Web Forms application is a set of beautifully-printed T4's, so I decided to throw the numbers into Excel and see what the damage was in our personal taxes.
And now we can get back to campaign finance. I'm not sure of this, but I think in the United States, political contributions are not tax-deductible. On your tax return there's a box you can check if you want $3 to go to the federal election fund, but it says right on the form that it won't affect how much tax you owe. Other than that I've never noticed any political stuff on our tax forms.
Here in Canada, however, you can get a tax deduction for making a political contribution. Yes. Actually it's worse than that. In Canada's screwy tax system, there aren't very many personal deductions; most things handled as deductions in the States are handled as tax credits here. For example, instead of deducting your student loan interest from your taxable income, you get a nonrefundable credit of 16% (which happens to be the lowest marginal tax rate) of your student loan interest. So a credit can never pull you down into a lower tax bracket, while a deduction can. Put another way, in the U.S., deductions come off the top of your income; in Canada, off the bottom. Charitable gifts are a little more complicated; your credit is 16% of the first $200, and 29% (the highest marginal rate) after that, up to 75% of your total income.
But as I said, it's even worse with political contributions. If you give $100 to a political party, you get a credit of $75. So instead of getting a credit at the lowest marginal rate (as with student loan interest) or at a mixed marginal rate (as with a charitable gift), you get a credit at nearly five times the lowest marginal rate or more than twice the highest. After $200 in contributions the rate drops to 50%; after $550 to 33.33% up to $1,075 in contributions ($550 in credit).
It's still a loss for the individual taxpayer, even at the best rate. You have a choice of giving $75 to the government or $100 to a political party; if you choose the latter, you're still out the additional $25. But look at your matching funds: the government matches you 3 for 1 for your first $50 in political contributions. Not bad, eh?
Except that this is a horrible abuse of government power. If the state is going to collect income tax, it has to allow deductions for the costs of doing business. Further, it usually (ab)uses its power and creates deductions to encourage certain behavior in its citizens: hence the charitable gift deduction to encourage giving; the student loan interest deduction to encourage education; in the U.S., the mortgage interest deduction to encourage homeownership.
But for the political contributions, which is it? Does the government of Canada recognize political contributions as a "cost of doing business"? Or does the government want to encourage money gifts to political parties?
Somebody, please tell me again how the campaign finance system in the U.S. is corrupt.