
As anyone who's read any of Mark's comments know, he's obsessed with cancer and nursing home patients. One of Mark's key arguments is that cancer patients will "demand and receive exemptions to the FairTax". Well, let's look at the numbers. According to the Center For Disease Control in Atlanta, "every year over one million people are diagnosed with cancer" (
click here). So, out of a total population of over 300 million, one million and change are diagnosed. For those of you like Mark, who don't understand basic math, that's 1 out of every 3,000,000 people (Google "1% of 300,000,000"). Mark says it's more like 33% of the population, but where he gets this figure is a mystery. Hmmm, that means one out of every three people has cancer. There are eleven houses in my subdivision, not one family has or knows anyone in their family that has cancer. Hmmm, wonder where all these cancer victims Mark refers to are living? Since the whole concept behind the FairTax is well, fairness, and remembering that the more exemptions means a higher rate for everyone else, how many of you readers think that 299,000,000 (that's two hundred ninety nine million) people should pay a higher federal tax rate because 1,000,000 (that's one million) have a special need? And what special need deserves an exemption over another? OK, let's look at nursing home patients. Again, looking at the figures from the CDC, there are 18,000 nursing homes in the U.S., that averages out to 360 nursing homes per state. There are 1.9 million beds, 1.6 million current residents, an occupancy rate of 87% and an average stay of 892 days per resident (
click here). That's less than 1% of the total population. Again, should 299,000,000 people have to pay a higher federal tax rate than 1% of the total population? Where would the exemptions stop? Heart disease is the nations number one killer. Shouldn't heart patients get an exemption too? How about unwed mothers? How about people with arthritis? Well, if they deserve an exemption, I have a hang-nail, I should be exempt too. Mark says that all these people will be lined up demanding and getting exemptions. Yeah, sure and congress is just gonna open up an exemption stand on Capital Hill and hand out exemptions willy-nilly to anyone that asks! Meanwhile the federal tax rate spirals up and out of control, uh huh, sure. Something Mark fails to see is, what makes the FairTax fair is... NO EXEMPTIONS... NONE...
PERIOD!