Purcell: Dreaming of tax simplification

I can’t help but dream this time of the year.

It’s the thick of winter, you see, which means I’m spending hours huddled in my home office getting a million tax details in order for my CPA.

And I’m dreaming of tax simplification.

President Donald Trump has shared a bold vision to potentially replace the income tax entirely in favor of tariffs.

Though I can’t imagine that ever happening, he has also promised to simplify tax filing to such a degree that “nine out of 10 Americans will be able to file their taxes on a single, little, beautiful sheet of paper.”

Could tax filing become as simple as it was for my father in 1959?

My dad kept a work draft of his return that he filled out in pencil, then completed the final version in ink before sending it to the IRS.

I still can’t believe how simple his tax form was.

In 1959, he paid a measly 5% in federal taxes.

Though the top income tax rate was 91% that year — President John Kennedy would slash rates a few years later — deductions were many.

Even middle-class people like my dad enjoyed their share of perks.

A heavy smoker then — who wasn’t? — he was able to deduct his cigarette taxes.

He deducted every penny he paid in gasoline taxes, too.

Were I able to do that now, with gasoline federal and state taxes totaling 77 cents a gallon in Pennsylvania, I’d be able to write off about $800 on the 1,000 or so gallons I use every year.

He took a $600 tax deduction, or $1,200 total, for each of his two dependents, my sisters Kathy and Krissy — that would be $10,000 in today’s dollars.

However, since 1997, the deduction for dependents was replaced with a child tax credit of $2,000 per child.

A deduction of $10,000 off of your taxes — say you are in the 22% tax bracket — would save you $2,200, but a tax credit would net you a tax savings of $4,000.

Incidentally, Vice President JD Vance is proposing that the tax credit per child be increased to $5,000.

For the most part, however, my dad paid significantly lower taxes than we pay now.

Here’s another item that caught my attention: In 1959, he paid only 1.25% of his income toward FICA (then, Social Security only, but now Social Security and Medicare), and his employer also paid 1.25% for a total FICA tax of 2.5%.

Today, the average working American pays 7.65% in FICA taxes and his or her employer kicks in another 7.65% (15.3% total).

I, being self-employed, have the pleasure of paying the full 15.3% myself.

If one makes $175,700 in income — the point at which only the 2.9% Medicare tax continues to apply because the Social Security tax is capped — he ends up paying nearly $27,000 in FICA taxes, not including federal, state and local taxes.

In any event, my father had his fair share of simple deductions in 1959, which helped offset his federal taxes. That is how he was able to keep his total federal tax tab at a measly 5%.

Better yet, his tax form was one sheet of paper printed on both sides. He had no calculator, nor did he need one. He always got a refund.

Then again, the federal tax code was about 15,000 pages then. Today, it is more than 70,000 pages.

Which is why I dream of the tax simplicity my dad enjoyed way back in 1959.

Tom Purcell’s column is distributed by Cagle Cartoons Inc. Email him at Tom@TomPurcell.com.