May 1st 2022
“Tax Season – But Is Filing Intentionally Ambiguous,” is the title of today’s article and as is the case with many prose… that 1 sentence just about sums up the entirety of today’s article, as well.
But let’s delve a little deeper…
So, generally in NYC you’re allowed to claim, “allowances,” on your taxes, withheld at the end of every pay period and typically outlined on every new hire’s W2 form. Nothing wrong with that, right? And on every employer’s W2 form there’s a sheet of paper where people can see these, “allowances,” which are usually for things like; Children, Spouses, Grandparent’s in your custody and other things for which the federal government awards tax exemptions.
But specifically, what are those allowances/tax exemptions? And they seemingly change every single year. Whereby, in 2014, I personally recall getting 4 allowances, including 1 tax allowance for student loan debts but in 2017, I only got 3 exemptions, as an example of the paperwork changing from year to year. And this has gone on for years… with misleading rhetoric and intentionally ambiguous paperwork forcing most Americans (or the ones who can afford it) to simply avoid tax paperwork altogether and to then hire an accountant. And so much so, that now-a-days these allowances have become so scrupled by politicians that most employer’s are now only giving their new hires only half of their federal W2 forms, with the hope that most people won’t even claim these previously mentioned tax exemptions!
And yes, you heard that correctly… where now this has become such a sticking point with the federal government, that most employer’s in NYC don’t even give their new hires the exemption sheet to properly file their W2’s anymore!
Nevertheless, not only does the federal government make this section of the W-2 intentionally ambiguous, assumingly to create a larger economy for accountants/tax consultants who then prey upon those who don’t file their own taxes… but also, now most employer’s in NYC are actually going a step further and now omitting the piece of paper within the W2 form, which outlines specifically what those allowances are! And to be honest, it keeps changing, so I don’t even know what those allowances are this year… which to me is intentionally ambiguous paperwork! Which is to say, that in today’s NYC… you’re lucky if your employer even gives you the entire W2 form at all… in order to see what allowances/exemptions you might qualify for. Whereby, most employer’s in NYC now opt to hide the allowance sheet.. selfishly believing that they deserve the money more than the federal government.
And they called me, “entitled,” as I washed Shelly’s dishes… downtown, in reference to Shelly Fireman, another billionaire in NYC who I don’t respect at all and who I might add… never started an Ai company like mine, or ever dealt with half of these issues like my small business has.
But to be clear, and yes, you read that correctly, MOST employers in NYC today don’t even give their new hires the entire W2 form… including billionaires like Shelly Fireman! And to make matters worse, often times this is done intentionally so that most people (*myself included) won’t understand the tax exemption system and then won’t claim their due exemptions! Where to be clear… most people get 1-2 allowances. In fact, having a child, outstanding student loan debt or a Spouse or a Grandparent in your custody, are typically reasons for a tax exemption. Nevertheless, often times today employers DO NOT WANT TO GIVE YOU those exemptions and often hide the exemption sheet, in turn hoping that their employee’s won’t claim those exemptions and then when they do… sometimes firing them, for demanding greater earnings, due to tax exemptions for which they qualify!
And this is nothing new… just some more intentionally ambiguous paperwork used for disguising a larger problem within America’s tax code. Nevertheless, with that being said this circumstance is in itself egregious… and as an, “internet reporter,” I urge you to please follow along with me for a minute while I delve slightly deeper into the contrasting theories, which I believe are now contributing to this, “financial circumstance.”
Failed Leadership
So not everybody in America believes in paying federal taxes. In fact, one of the ways that Donald Trump got rich in the 1970’s and 1980’s was by essentially refusing to pay his mortgage and subsequently, the property taxes that went along with it. Yes, you heard that correctly. In the 1970’s and 1980’s when Donald Trump first rose to prominence one of his first and biggest, “deals,” was actually based around his refusal to pay a mortgage on a significant share of NYC real estate, which then essentially turned into him, “daring the bank to foreclose,” with the understood retaliation that another owner would jeopardize NYC’s, “WASP culture,” along with the understood threat that Trump’s friends on Wall Street would retaliate if the bank foreclosed on his property. Yet, during that classic episode of, “Lifestyles Of People Who We Have Nothing In Common With,” Trump threatened the banks… that were they to foreclose on his real estate that his friends on Wall Street would undermine their bank and essentially take them under, as well. Needless to say, this is where the concept of, “refinancing your mortgage,” comes from today, in it’s modern form.
(*And Trump also tore down centuries old artwork from the facade of several NYC skyscrapers that same year, “because NYC was starting to look too much like Europe.” Thanks Gold Member. Although, to Donald’s defense… I would assume that several bankruptcy’s were heavily scrutinized around this time (the 1970’s and 1980’s) due to unruly property taxes in the NYC area, pre-1985.)
But let’s examine that episode from 1975 a little more closely… because as we all know Donald is often remarking on several things at once and most of his decisions are calculated positions. (*And I am not one of these, “Donald Trump is the devil,” type of people… but this is a true story. And furthermore, if Donald himself would like to clarify anything that I might be mis-representing… then be my guest, I only Tweet at his son every 2 months on Twitter.)
Regardless, in retrospect and judging by Trump’s current role atop the GOP, those arguments now seem as though they were nothing but veiled rhetoric in a city where MOST people, I would say, don’t pay taxes. Whereby, in hindsight, I think that whole episode in NYC history… was really over welfare and decades of high property taxes… and the fact that Trump, among others in NYC… are in these offices that most people will never see, even if Trump can’t afford them himself! Something rarely discussed in NYC, which is the illusion of power…
And as another VERY SIMILAR example of this same occurrence, how many subscriptions does the NY Times have to sell in order to maintain their 60 story building, today? You do the math… 10$ a paper? 50k dollars in monthly air conditioning costs… never mind.
Because what if some blogger took the NY Times market share? Ya know…
And that’s basically what happened with Trump in 1975, whereby the city’s wealthy elites sided with Donald / The NY Times, that they shouldn’t have to sell their building. Then in the following decades this became the practice of, “refinancing your mortgage,” and from 1990-2010 the rest of America was also given, “a second chance,” financially, in the form of mortgage, “refinances.”
Nevertheless, who am I to judge? Because NYC elites, typically side with NYC elites in these types of matters and this was not the first time that someone walked away from a bankruptcy still filthy rich, in America.
But with that being said, on one side… many current American’s disagree with the federal tax code for a variety of reasons and in this instance, property taxes were essentially used to justify the bankruptcy and allowed Donald to maintain his property. And I live at the grass roots level, where you hear these conversations frequently about how some people feel as though they shouldn’t have to pay taxes at all, or that prior taxation was unfair, or that taxation is just another bureaucracy, ultimately infringing upon our freedom(s). But then to continue upon that point, even more people disagree with America’s tax code, I find, because they often believe that welfare is inequitably distributed to minorities, through food stamps and public transit… and even through military expenditures. Whereby, this argument, essentially allowed Donald Trump to escape bankruptcy in the 1970’s and 1980’s due to prior taxation. Whereby, in fact, many people in the GOP today would PREFER a 0% tax economy, for this very reason, which would then, “in theory,” lead to more violence amongst the general public and less safety across the country. Which was the original purpose of welfare… but now who is welfare protecting? Donald or the minorities?
And this is where you see all of these mis-leading headlines about how companies like Amazon and other corporate entities pay 0$ in taxes, which is hardly true at all, whereby, in reality… I would guess that less than half of American citizens file taxes, meaning that in reality most CITIZENS pay 0$ in taxes… which is why these corporations spread that propaganda, to infuse the public with their own frustrations.
And to that point… right away, you can see where the NOT SEE’s… A-Z and everything in between, have turned this into a smug ordeal, politically. (*And I use the word, “Nazi,” here, in order to describe a political party bent upon miscommunication, in order to convey unpopular beliefs to the general public, without expressly conveying unpopular beliefs.)
Regardless and to keep a long story short… and I’ll wrap this article up after this… but this entire circumstance is due to an intentionally ambiguous tax code which has been used as a scapegoat by some of America’s richest men, regarding tax law! And to that point, this is the same W2 that everyone in America typically files, whereby, not only are more than half of the employer’s in NYC not even giving employee’s their full W2 pamphlet anymore (specifically Shelly Fireman), which outlines individual allowances… but I also believe that this is being done intentionally as part of a broader system of taxation which at it’s CORE, holds the keys to INDIVIDUAL SUCCESS and social mobility!
Which is to say that certain people in the US gov’t seemingly want you to lie on your taxes… because they take great pride in paying taxes themselves and conversely, don’t want you to pay taxes like them and then in turn, challenge their authority… or their SOCIAL STATUS, in America today… social status that once got Donald Trump out of a bankruptcy.
And if you can pick up, what I’m putting down… then next month’s article is on, “Internet Piracy and Food Stamps,” but in the meantime enjoy your 10$ DVD bin at Walmart…
Do you guys accept food stamps for DVD’s? Because everyone just steals from Don… apparently.
-William Larsen, CiviliansNews.com Founder