- Democrats are up in arms
over a Treasury Departmentreport showing tax refunds
this year are downabout 9% over last year.
And they're blaming President Trump's,
Tax Cuts and Jobs Act.
California Senator Kamala Harris tweeted,
the average tax refund is down about $170
compared to last year.
Let's call the president'stax cut what it is,
a middle-class tax hiketo line the pockets
of already wealthycorporations and the 1%.
But tax expert, Dan Pilla,says Democrat lawmakers
and some tax payers arelooking at it all wrong.
He says receiving a smallerrefund is actually a good thing
because that refund is onlywhat you overpaid in taxes
and is no indication ofwhether your tax liability
went up or down.
Pilla also says that thewhole controversy shows that
the average person has noidea what they pay in taxes
and he says that's theproblem with the system.
Many taxes are hiddenand people don't know
what their tax burden actually is.
Heather Sells, CBN News.
- Thanks Heather andtax expert, Dan Pilla,
is joining us here.
It's always a pleasure to have him.
Dan good to see you again.- It's good to see you, Pat.
Happy birthday by the way.- Thank you very much, sir.
I'm getting close (laughs).
- Getting close.
- Let me ask you, what isthe deal on this tax refund?
Is that a good thing or a bad thing?
- Well first of all,it's never a good thing
to get a tax refund becauseit means you overpaid.
- Yeah.- All right,
the typical tax payer overpaysby about $3,000 a year.
That means you're payingabout $275 a month,
month in and month outin taxes you don't owe.
Right?
And you have to wait a full year,
actually more than a year,
14, 15 months, beforeyou get your money back
and then they don't give you any interest.
So, it's the world'sworst way to save money.
- Why do people do that?
- Well they do thatprimarily out of ignorance.
They don't know how to fillout the withholding form,
the W-4 form- Yeah.
- to report to theiremployer the correct number
of allowances that they wanna claim
and so they think theyhave to overpay their taxes
because they think thiswithholding is just automatic
and it's not, you have theright to adjust the withholding
to match your tax liabilityand people just don't know how
to do that.
The National Taxpayer Advocatehas reported to Congress
that the vast majority ofAmerican people have no idea
how to work their way throughthat W-4 instruction form
because it's so confusing.
And this is part of theproblem with the tax law
and they do it on purpose, Pat.
- Yeah (laughing).- 'Cause they want the money.
They want the money.- Well what about
the whole, you fill out apostcard and send it in?
- And that's a farce too.
Listen, the tax form was re-designed.
All they did is they took 79 questions,
- Yeah.- or 79 lines,
off of the Form 1040, andthey spread those 79 lines
over six additionalattachments to the tax return.
So, the From 1040 is shorternow, it's only 12 or 14 lines,
- Yeah.- but all the rest of those
70, what 65 lines or so, arespread over six more forms.
- Incredible.- So, it's a
complete farce, it's a total farce.
- What about this deal aboutthose states, like California
and New York, that have such high taxes
and they don't get a deductionon their state taxes beyond
a certain percentage.
- Well what happened isthey capped the deduction
for state and local taxes at $10,000.
- Yeah.- All right,
and so these states that have high taxes,
New York, California, you knowa couple of the other states
out there, Connecticutand so forth, New Jersey,
they're all complainingthat now they're citizens
have to pay higher federal taxes,
- Mm-hmm.- because they can't get
a full deduction forthe state income taxes.
My advice to the high tax states?
Cut your tax burdens.
Lower your taxes for your citizens.
Don't whine about thecap on the deduction.
Lower your tax burdens forthe citizens of your states.
That's why people are leavingthose high tax states Pat.
- [Pat] Well, theyreally are, aren't they?
- They are, they're leavingthose high tax states.
- What are the low tax,do you have any class
that you recommend thatthey go to Florida?
- (laughs) I've got alot of clients that have,
of course, I have clientsall around the country.
- Yeah.- So again,
we've got 'em everywhere.
But, yeah, the fact of the matter is
that there's all kinds ofpeople that are leaving
the high tax jurisdictions
that are going to lower tax states.
But here's the thing about the setup piece
that I wanna talk about.
You know they talked about,they talked about early on
the tax refunds being down.
- Yeah.- But, Pat, when they did
that analysis that was over amonth ago when they did that.
There was fewer than20 million tax returns
that were filed
all right?- Mm-hmm.
- So it was a very small simple size.
Now they redid the analysisjust the other day,
I got most recent numberswith me right now.
Based on over 50 million tax returns
that were filed.- Right.
- So almost the a thirdof the returns are in now.
The tax refunds are up, theaverage tax refund is higher now
than it was last year,- Yes.
so these, this people that are claiming
that the lower tax refundsprove that the Jobs Act
was tax cuts for the rich,it's complete nonsense,
it's a total fraud.
The fact of the matter is,80% of the people out there
are gonna see a tax cut andnow we're seeing that manifest
in higher refunds, not lowerrefunds, higher refunds,
than last year as more ofthe tax returns roll in
during the tax season.- Well to determine
the actual tax burden, theDemocrats say will only help
the top 1%, it's a tax cutfor the rich, et cetera.
Talk about that.
- Well it's just a complete farce,
Pat, it's just absolute,- It is.
- Listen, the Democrats, theleftist Democrats continue
to pound on this ideathat every tax reform
is nothing but tax cuts for the rich,
and it's simply nonsense.
The fact of the matter is,the top 1% of income earners
pay about 13% of all of the taxes paid,
the top 5% of income earnerspay over 60% of the tax burden.
There is no such thing asrich people not paying taxes.
It's just complete nonsense.
- You hear Bernie Sanders say,well let's make the tax code
fair and let's make the richpay their quote, fair share,
what is that?
- There's no definitionof fair share, Pat,
that's the problem.
There's no definition of it.
And now Bernie Sanders isproposing a wealth tax.
- Yeah.- Not an income tax.
Not a tax based on what you earn.
He wants a second assessmenton top of the income tax
based on the assetsthat you've accumulated.
It's like an estate tax, Pat,only you're not dead yet.
These people don't evenwanna wait until your dead
before they steal your money.
- Well that's unconstitutional isn't it?
- It's immoral and it's unconstitutional.
- Yeah.- It's just,
listen, there's no other wayto describe that kind of tax.
It's outright unadulterated,unmitigated, theft,
that's what it is.
- Well, why do you think theDemocrats have gone so far
to the left on their proposals?
It's just insane.
I mean, Medicare for all, tuition for all.
- They're falling allover themselves to create
more giveaway programsto entice people to vote
for something for nothing.
That's what it's all about.
It's all about, how can wegive, how can we buy votes
for the leftist Democratsas fast as we possibly can?
Now here's the thing that'stroubling about Bernie Sanders
and his wealth tax.- All right.
- According to a political poll,
- All right.- 60% of the people
that were polled Pat, arein favor of this thing
as long as it's pointed atquote, unquote, rich people.
Here's what the problem is,- Mm.
- the leftist Democrats think
that anybody who's making$100,000 a year or more is rich.
That's what the definition is.
Listen Pat, that's, you know,
when you got a husband and wife,
you got two or three kids in the family,
$100,000 a year is not that much money.
- It's not, yeah.- it's not that
much money.
- What is the average income these days?
- The median income rightnow is about $54,000.
Plus or minus.
- Well that's not reallyenough to live very well on.
- No it's not.
Especially if you considerthat you got a family,
if you get a one-income earner,
we're talking about $55,000 a year,
- Yeah.- Roughly.
A kid or two, you know, two or three kids.
That's not a lot of money.
If you got a husband andwife that are out there
in the workforce, youknow, now we multiply
that times two basically.
So you've got, there'syour $110,000 a year.
You're a rich family.
- Yeah (laughs).- Yeah that's rich
by their definition.
And they just wannasteal more of your money
because they think thatsomehow you're taking advantage
of the system because you'reout there working hard
and trying to make a living.
- You know, you rememberObama, you didn't build that?
You know,- Yeah,
you didn't make that.- we didn't do that,
the government didn't that for you.
- [Pat] The government did it (laughs).
- The government did that for you,
you didn't do that
by yourself.- Did you see that statistic
I mentioned earlier thatwe have more millionaires
in America than there arepeople living in Sweden?
Have you checked that?- I did see that.
- Is that for certain?- Yep.
And it's astonishing.
And you know what, God bless these people.
- Yeah.- Listen,
here's the thing, Pat, ifyou make the money honestly,
- Yeah.- if you don't steal if
from somebody.
If you earn money peacefully,then you have a right
to use and enjoy that money.- Mm-hmm.
- You don't owe it to the government
and you certainly don't owe it necessarily
to somebody who didn't earn it.
Now you've got a biblical responsibility
and a moral responsibilityto voluntarily give back,
tithe to a churches andorganizations that are gonna
use that money to helppeople that are downtrodden
and so forth.
You know, we all understandthose biblical principles.
But, those principlesare based on conscience
and those principles arebased on voluntary action,
not the force of government.- Yeah.
- When you've got the governmentthat's a gun to your head,
that's not charity Pat, that's theft.
- How come the majority ofpeople, these you people,
think socialism is a good thing?
Socialism is horrible.
- Because they're ignorant.- They're ignorant?
- Listen, it's as simple as this.
Our schools are turningout high school kids
that are ignorant of civics.
I'll give you some numbers- Go ahead.
- from the National Report Card.
Of course you know this is
the organization that looks at what the
educational levels are- Right.
- in our high schools.
And we've got numbers thatshow that fewer than 40%
of the high school graduates,
now we're talking abouthigh school seniors,
are proficient in reading,
fewer than 35% are proficient in writing,
fewer than 25% are proficient in civics,
and this is the numberthat I remember vividly,
it's 12% are proficient in U.S. history.
So, we've got generations of kids Pat,
that can't read and write,
that don't know howtheir government works,
and know nothing about U.S. history.
And so when you take all a that,
and you add all that together,
what you get are socialistsbecause these are the people
who think that somehow governmentis gonna do them a favor,
that somehow government cangive them something for nothing.
It's ignorance talkingPat, that's all it is.
- That's a shocking indictmenton our educational system
though isn't it?- Yeah, it's,
and it's what we call thefailed academy for sure.
- Well you know they'vehad that modern math
and that modern teaching and so forth
that just is absurd thatpeople aren't being taught the,
they can't read and write?
They're functionallyilliterate by the time they get
through the third grade.- Yep.
- But you're saying it's ageneration of socialists,
of ignorant socialists that's being,
- That's what it is, I mean listen,
the more ignorant people are of history,
- Yeah.- the more they tend
to believe that socialism is a good thing.
The more educated people arewhen it comes to history,
the more they realize that socialism
is not only a failed system Pat,
it's a diabolical systemthat is responsible
for the murder of hundredsof millions of people
across the world.
It is not, and listen, wedon't have any better example
in front of our face right now
- Venezuela.- then what's going on
in Venezuela.- Absolutely.
- And yet people look at that,
I don't even think they look at it Pat.
The thing is they don't even look at it.
And yet there it is, rightthere, a glaring example
of what's going on.
- I would like to launch theDan Pilla for president society
if you ever decide to run (laughs).
(Dan laughing)
Very articulate, thank you Dan.
God bless you.- Thank you Pat,
God bless you.- Appreciate it.
