Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Strega on November 10, 2012 at 5:25pm

Hell yes!  Actually I think the churches should be volunteering to be taxed.  I can't believe in the 21st century we still don't tax them.

• ▶ Reply

Permalink Reply by SteveInCO on November 10, 2012 at 8:41pm

They should pay the same taxes as everyone else.

I doubt doing so would raise the 1,300 billion dollars we would need to balance the Federal budget though; they'd have to be a five trillion dollar a year "enterprise" for that to be possible, and that's about a third of our GDP.

• ▶ Reply

Permalink Reply by Ed on November 11, 2012 at 12:43am

Every little bit helps they say. Though charity dies at the church doors it seems. What goes in doesn't always come back out. 

• ▶ Reply

Permalink Reply by Donald S. Chase on November 11, 2012 at 9:51am

Since 1789 we have had 43 Presidents,121 Supreme Court Justices, and 15,000 or so Members of Congress and all have professed belief in one of the Abrahamic religions. Only a fool would believe that they are going up upset the status quo  to do what is right. Even Herb Silverman could not get that one past the Supreme Court.

• ▶ Reply

Permalink Reply by Dale Headley on November 11, 2012 at 1:51pm

Yes, we should.  But I doubt that it would make much of a dent in the federal deficit.  We should be doing it in order to make it clear that religion should NOT be entitled to a special seat at the table.  Furthermore, exempting churches from taxation is a de facto violation of the establishment cause of the Constitution.  

• ▶ Reply

Permalink Reply by Morgan Matthew on November 11, 2012 at 4:18pm

$71,000,000,000 

We know churches get tax exemptions, but how much money does that actually come out to?

University of Tampa professor Ryan T. Cragun along with students Stephanie Yeager and Desmond Vega ran some calculations and figured out a number:

While some people may be bothered by the fact that there are pastors who live in multimillion dollar homes, this is old news to most. But here is what should bother you about these expensive homes: You are helping to pay for them! You pay for them indirectly, the same way local, state, and federal governments in the United States subsidize religion — to the tune of about $71 billion every year.

So… chump change.

Their article (with a defense of how they calculated the amount) appears in the June/July 2012 issue of Free Inquiry.

“The issue of religious tax preferment is especially relevant now because the number of Americans living outside any religious tradition continues to grow,” said Tom Flynn, Free Inquiry’s editor. “That underscores the unfairness of taxing all Americans to subsidize religious institutions that only some Americans utilize.”

The researchers already know what they’ll get criticized for:

… before we get into our calculations, we think it best to address a criticism that is likely to be raised about this article. By suggesting that these groups should pay taxes, we are likely to be criticized by those who think that religions are largely charitable institutions engaged in beneficial service or charitable work and should therefore be exempt from taxes.

Cue reporter Kimberly Winston‘s article in which she interviews a critic of this finding:

… Mark Rienzi, senior counsel at the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty, said thatAmericans have made a democratic decision that religious institutions are good for our communities — believers and atheists alike.

“Whether it is the Quakers opposing slavery, Reverend King arguing for equality, or a Catholic soup kitchen feeding and sheltering all in need,” Rienzi said, “our history is full of examples confirming the great public benefit of our religious diversity.”

Right… because church leaders never use the pulpit to oppose civil rights for gay Americans, or speak out against affordable/accessible health-care for women, or use the extra money to buy themselves a larger house because Jesus wants them to be prosperous…

The researchers also ran a few other calculations:

States bypass an estimated $26.2 billion per year by not requiring religious institutions to pay property taxes.

…

Capital gains tax exemptions for religious institutions may be as much as $41 million a year.

…

U.S. clergy may claim as much as $1.2 billion in tax exemptions annually via the parsonage allowance.

Given the current political scene, none of this is going to change anytime soon. Religious groups have far too much power in Washington and they’re not about to ask the government to remove their special privileges. But we can keep the pressure on.

Even if these calculations are proven to be off, the principle isn’t going to change: Religion is a business, churches get tax breaks they don’t really deserve, and we’d all be better off if they paid their fair share.

Via: http://www.patheos.com/blogs/friendlyatheist/2012/06/16/the-yearly-...

• ▶ Reply

Permalink Reply by SteveInCO on November 12, 2012 at 9:11am

I would say that if a church actually does engage in charitable activity, it should be deductible, but the presumption that the entire church is a charitable activity (or should be treated as if it were one) is ludicrous.

Making churches subject to the tax means they'd have to fill out a 1040 or equivalent and itemize their charitable work.

• ▶ Reply

Permalink Reply by matt.clerke on November 11, 2012 at 5:16pm

Wouldn't taxing the churches go a long way toward balancing the federal budget?

Yes

Shouldn't we atheists be pushing for this?

Yes

Glad I could be of assistance...

• ▶ Reply

Permalink Reply by SteveInCO on November 12, 2012 at 9:12am

Wouldn't taxing the churches go a long way toward balancing the federal budget?

Yes

You fail your reading comprehension class.  71 billion dollars out of 1327 billion dollars is a drop in the bucket.

I do agree we should push for this, but what it will really accomplish is not deficit reduction but a removal of a tax favor from something we (with ample justification) do not like.

• ▶ Reply

Permalink Reply by jason sadler on November 12, 2012 at 1:56am

That is not going to make any real difference though it is going to happen. In the next year or 2 our economy is going to tank in a way that will make 2008 look like a nice picnic in comparison

• ▶ Reply

Permalink Reply by Tom Sarbeck on November 12, 2012 at 3:40am

Sarah, are you employed and NOT paying the Social Security tax?

• ▶ Reply

Permalink Reply by SteveInCO on November 12, 2012 at 9:08am

I am not sure what the point of this question is.

The tax--including the "employer's share" that you never even see, but is a cost to your employer of having you work for them, and which therefore ought to be considered part of your compensation--is not enough to pay for the program, and this disparity is only going to get worse with time unless something is changed.

Social security does not actually put your money into a savings account with your name on it; rather, it promptly sends it out the door to someone who is already retired, somewhere.  By about 2050 there will only be two people working for each retiree, and you can imagine what it will be liked to be taxed half of what his or her benefit check is, plus the overhead of the program itself (the people running social security themselves need to be paid).  If this money is not somehow taxed, it will have to be borrowed (resulting in bankruptcy) or created from nothing (resulting in inflation, which will only result in larger COLAs for people on social security, so it's not even a short term solution).  So at some point--without severe benefit reductions or some sort of phaseout plan the program will collapse.  It's not a matter of IF but rather of WHEN.

• ▶ Reply

• ‹ Previous
• 1
• 2
• 3
• 4
• Next ›
• Page