Floridians & Sales Tax
I couldn’t stop laughing! It was so funny! What a great joke! Wait a minute. It’s not a joke? I stared at the radio incredulously.
I had been driving along, listening to the morning radio, when the DJs came on, talking about a movement by “Floridians”. (Now, I’m a Floridian and no one asked me about this, so I’m sure it’s not all Floridians, but anyway…) It seems that these Floridians are upset by the fact that they cannot take a deduction on their Federal tax returns for State income tax payments. At this point, I’m already beginning to giggle. They are UPSET that they can’t deduct something that they DON’T HAVE TO PAY!! Are you people LISTENING to yourselves? But wait! It gets better. Rather than having someone in Tallahassee explain to these people that they already have a benefit that the rest of the country doesn’t have, our legislature has come up with a way to pacify our logic-impaired state-mates. The solution is - drumroll, please - to allow Floridians to deduct their sales tax payments! Now considering how many items you pay sales tax on, this sounds like a great idea! But let’s think this through. In order to claim this deduction, you would obviously have to file an itemized return. So you would have to save ALL your receipts for EVERY purchase, for the ENTIRE YEAR! I don’t know about you, but in my family, this would require numerous large wardrobe size boxes. AND, just in case you are ever audited by the IRS, you would need to save these multiple, humongous boxes for 7 YEARS!! So I’m thinking that by the time you’re into your 3rd or 4th year, you’ve rented a storage unit or two for your sales receipts to live in. And by the time that 7th year rolls around, they’re living in their own apartment. It’s CRAZY! Of course if you buy the apartment, you can deduct the amount of the sales tax. Just be sure to save your receipt!
I had been driving along, listening to the morning radio, when the DJs came on, talking about a movement by “Floridians”. (Now, I’m a Floridian and no one asked me about this, so I’m sure it’s not all Floridians, but anyway…) It seems that these Floridians are upset by the fact that they cannot take a deduction on their Federal tax returns for State income tax payments. At this point, I’m already beginning to giggle. They are UPSET that they can’t deduct something that they DON’T HAVE TO PAY!! Are you people LISTENING to yourselves? But wait! It gets better. Rather than having someone in Tallahassee explain to these people that they already have a benefit that the rest of the country doesn’t have, our legislature has come up with a way to pacify our logic-impaired state-mates. The solution is - drumroll, please - to allow Floridians to deduct their sales tax payments! Now considering how many items you pay sales tax on, this sounds like a great idea! But let’s think this through. In order to claim this deduction, you would obviously have to file an itemized return. So you would have to save ALL your receipts for EVERY purchase, for the ENTIRE YEAR! I don’t know about you, but in my family, this would require numerous large wardrobe size boxes. AND, just in case you are ever audited by the IRS, you would need to save these multiple, humongous boxes for 7 YEARS!! So I’m thinking that by the time you’re into your 3rd or 4th year, you’ve rented a storage unit or two for your sales receipts to live in. And by the time that 7th year rolls around, they’re living in their own apartment. It’s CRAZY! Of course if you buy the apartment, you can deduct the amount of the sales tax. Just be sure to save your receipt!