>One question: FairTax is 23% of the sales price that does not
>include the tax, right?

Actually that figure is misleading. It annoys me that all the FairTax material continues to use it. The truth is that the FairTax is "comparable to a 23% tax on income". In other words it's actually closer to a 30% sales tax.

The important thing that (imho) people fail to take into account when evaluating the FairTax are all the *regressive* flat taxes they already pay.

SS is currently 6.2% plus an equal employer match. That's a 12.4% flat tax (i.e. regressive) everyone pays, before income taxes even come into play.

Medicare is 2.9% split evenly between employee and employer. The two together amount to 15.3%. Worse yet (for the non-wealthy) these taxes only apply to the first $76k earned.

Added to these are federal and state unemployment tax. FUTA is 6.2% but you can take credit for any SUTA you pay. In another jab at the non-wealthy, this tax is only levied on the first $7k.

Bottom line: there's a crapload of taxes I (we) pay before even filing our income taxes.

> What's so groundbreaking about this FairTax anyway? Isn't it just a normal VAT?

It's a VAT that replaces a bunch of other taxes. It would replace the federal personal income tax, corporate taxes, capital gains tax, and estate tax. It also incorporates a "prebate" system where every adult gets a periodic payment equal to the amount someone at the poverty level would expect to pay in sales tax. The thought is that if you're *at* the poverty level then you pay no federal tax.