The Picket Line — 19 February 2006

19 February 2006

As a follow-up to my review of Ammon Hennacy’s autobiography from Thursday’s Picket Line, here’s the text of a leaflet he handed out while picketing the revenue office in 1951:

How do I get by with it?
I don’t know for sure.
I have picketed thirteen days in the last three years here in Phoenix against war, the draft, and paying taxes for all this. I have been detained by the police and released four times, and been called to the tax office often.
I was a conscientious objector in both World Wars. In 1942 I refused to register for the draft and resigned from a civil service job in Milwaukee where I had been a social worker for eleven years. As I do not believe in shooting I have since then worked on farms where no withholding tax is taken from my pay, so I do not buy a gun for others to shoot. The tax man has tried to garnishee my wages; now I work by the day for different farmers and if necessary am paid in advance in order that no garnishee is effective.
I believe in the idea of voluntary poverty somewhat after the pattern of St. Francis, Thoreau, Tolstoy and Gandhi. I have no car or anything the tax man can get. I make a true report of my income but openly refuse to pay a cent of tax.
I am a non-church Christian. I believe in the Sermon on the Mount, especially because it is more revolutionary than opportunistic Communist tactics. I do not put my trust in money or bombs, but in God.
I am an Anarchist who believes that all government exists not to help people but to continue in power exploiters, bureaucrats and politicians who keep us on the run with their continual depressions and wars.
If you believe in capitalism and war and think you get your money’s worth in paying taxes that is your business. My message is to those who are beginning to question the idea that preparing for war brings peace. It is also to those who believe somewhat as I do but who are afraid to stand up and say so.…
…If you are ready for my message here is a starter:
REFUSE to become a soldier
REFUSE to make munitions
REFUSE to buy war bonds
REFUSE to pay income taxes
STUDY the Sermon on the Mount
STUDY Gandhi’s non-violent methods
STUDY Jefferson’s idea of life on the land
“STUDY war no more.”
“Better to light a candle than curse the darkness.” A Christian Anarchist does both.

Fred Ecks reports: “I filed my taxes yesterday. Total federal income tax: $0.00. Total state income tax: $0.00. This makes four years in a row without paying a dime in income tax. Ever since the ‘retirement savings contribution credit’ went into effect as a bone thrown to the poor as part of the tax cut for the rich in 2001, I’ve lived below taxable levels. I strive to maintain this as a form of protest against the actions of the federal government in recent years.”

Tax resister Jeff Knaebel spoke on January 30^th at the Gandhi National Memorial in Pune at an event honoring the anniversary of Gandhi’s birth. A transcript of his speech is on-line. Excerpts:

I left my country almost 15 years ago in order to start a new life in Sacred India, so as to be no longer an accomplice to this systematic murder by my payment of income taxes into this ruthless war machine. One of the waypoints that crystallized my decision was a visit to the Museum at Los Alamos National Laboratory, birthplace of the atomic bomb. The Temple of Death at the Mother Mandir of the Science of Total Annihilation. How could I ever again be sweat at law in an economy whose best and brightest produce this abominable machinery of mass murder, with my tax support? I joined the river of the dispossessed, the disenfranchised. How can we call this a “civilization” — this mindless Corporate State War Machine — in the service of which so many children go to bed hungry, so many shattered lives are lived in silent, burning fury?

Gandhi wrote, “The individual has a soul, but as the State is a soulless machine, it can never be weaned from the violence to which it owes its very existence.” There was a recent movie Maine Gandhi Ko Nahin Mara, with theme “We have murdered Gandhi” (by disregarding his message of nonviolence). I left the American Corporate Warfare State Machine in order not to be among those who murdered Gandhi.

Yesterday was my first day this year working at the VITA program in San Francisco, helping people with lower incomes file for tax refunds and credits. In the course of helping pull a few thousand dollars out of the U.S. treasury and give it to a handful of San Franciscans, I naturally thought tax geekery thoughts, and one question came to the fore:

Is it possible for a single person with no children, like myself, to reduce my total federal tax burden (counting income tax and FICA) to or below zero by using the (refundable) Earned Income Tax Credit?

I’ve long been curious, but I was sure that even if the answer was “yes” the income at which this would be true would be very low, and so I’d never actually tried to run the numbers until yesterday.

It turns out that the answer is no:

Earned Income	FICA paid	EITC	Sum
$1,000	$153	−$78	$75
$2,000	$306	−$155	$151
$3,000	$459	−$231	$228
$4,000	$612	−$308	$304
$5,000	$765	−$384	$381
$6,000	$918	−$399	$519
$7,000	$1,071	−$361	$710
$8,000	$1,224	−$285	$939
$9,000	$1,377	−$208	$1,169
$10,000	$1,530	−$132	$1,398
$11,000	$1,683	−$55	$1,628
$12,000	$1,836	−$0	$1,836

(This data presents a simple case where all income is earned income and assumes that the recipient has no federal income tax.)

As you can see, at no point does the earned income tax credit exceed the amount of FICA paid, so the government comes out ahead at every income level.

This is not the case, though, for people who aren’t childless. People with one child will get more back from EITC than they paid out in FICA if they brought in about $15,000 or less ($16,000 if they’re married and filing jointly) — you take the most away from the government at an income of about $8,000. Add a second child, and you come out ahead at about $20,000 (or $21,000) and below, with the peak at about $11,000. This does not include the refundable Additional Child Tax Credit which would likely also be available to such filers:

a graph of E.I.T.C. versus FICA for various earned income levels and filing categories shows the windows in which some filers get more back in refunds than they paid in taxes

(The vertical left axis of the chart represents the total amount of money you get from the government, or, if negative, the total amount you pay to the government, by adding your EITC refund and subtracting your FICA payments. “0” means no children; “0J” means no children, and married filing jointly; etc. Again: this data assumes a simple case in which all income is earned income, federal income tax is zero, and no other refundable credits are applied for.)

So it is indeed possible to have the government pay you more in tax “refunds” than you paid to it in taxes.

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How you can resist funding the government → a survey of tactics of historical tax resistance campaigns → counsel people in legal tax avoidance techniques → Volunteer Income Tax Assistance (VITA) → my participation in: ▶; ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦; I’ve started training to be a Volunteer Income Tax Assistance program volunteer — I’m up to my ears in bureaucratic formage but I like the idea of taking from the government and giving to the poor.; Saturday was my first day as a VITA volunteer, and Sunday I was part of a war tax resistance introductory workshop.; The discussion on the Claire Files Board continues, with a fable about a troll bridge.; Some notes on LILOs, VITA, and the difficulties of constructing the rhetoric of motivation.; Seymour Hersh gets the goods on how the abuse at Abu Ghraib was a direct result of decisions made by the Secretary of Defense. Also: The I.R.S. thanks me, with a colorful badge and certificates of appreciation, for my invaluable contribution to the American tax system.; The Dubya Squad went from the attacks on 9/11 to capitalizing on them by bringing the government and the media and the people on-board with their Iraq War agenda in a year and a half flat. Three years after that, the anti-war movement is still gathering massive committees to draft statements of purpose and plan more meetings to consider proposals.; Geov Parrish reminds taxpayers that they’re volunteering to buy the bullets for their own firing squads. Also: 48 kind-hearted dopes voluntarily sent in more money than the I.R.S. said they owed last year, just because they felt bad about the national debt.; The I.R.S. will train you in the art of taking money from the government and giving it to poor families — for free. Also: maybe you heard about ExxonMobil’s record-breaking profits last year, but did you hear who really made out like a bandit?; Yesterday was my first day as a VITA volunteer this tax season, and the government is $2,314 poorer. Also: a heaping helping of miscellany, including grass roots action against domestic torture enablers, Democratic plans to increase military spending, Homeland Security pork, Possum living, attacks on tax collectors, the Coalition to Get the Stop Funding the War Coalition to Stop Funding the War, federal employees who moonlight as tax evaders, and tax policy by merry men in tights.; Nazi-occupied Denmark is a favorite case study to advocates of nonviolent resistance theory, but one group of resisters in Denmark read Thoreau, turned their backs on nonviolence, and began bombing railroads, bridges and factories. Also: another day of VITA and the government is a little poorer.; Another day of VITA and the Treasury is a little poorer. Also: personal tax earmarking… it’s an idea.; War tax resisters John & Pat Schwiebert, Rod Nippert, Ed Hedemann, and Marjoire Nelson are in the papers. Also: today was my last day as a volunteer income tax preparer (how much did I cost the government this year?). And: Jim Bouman discusses war tax resistance with his skeptical son. Also: download a Sharon Jones and the Dap Kings concert video of “What If We All Stopped Paying Taxes.”; Today I put on my Robin Hood cap & feather and worked my first day at the VITA program this season — taking $5,744 from the government to give back to low-income households. Also: more on the tax resistance writer who became a Holocaust denier, Bradley R. Smith.; Another day working with the volunteer income tax assistance program — and I have mixed feelings about it. Also: the War Resisters League issues their annual federal spending pie chart. You probably won’t be surprised to note that military spending is up. And it won’t be going down any time soon, since the costs of the Iraq War will keep piling up for years to come.; I’ve been helping low-income people apply for the Earned Income Tax Credit in the hopes that this would in some small way take money away from government. Have I been tricked into complicity with the machine? Also: letters from Anthony Benezet and Moses Brown hint at a major Quaker defense of tax resistance that so far has eluded my sleuthing.
How you can resist funding the government → a survey of tactics of historical tax resistance campaigns → counsel people in legal tax avoidance techniques → Volunteer Income Tax Assistance (VITA) → Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC): ▶; ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦; How to Resist the Federal Income Tax by Getting Under the Tax Line; The discussion on the Claire Files Board continues, with a fable about a troll bridge.; Paul Loeb tells activists not to get discouraged, because the impossible may take a little while. Also: how you can take billions of dollars out of the U.S. treasury and give it back to the poor people it was stolen from — and how you can get the government to show you how it’s done! And Sean Corrigan shows how the military budget tracks the trade deficit, and shows the correlations with the budget deficit, the mental deficit and the moral deficit.; Who knew? A pro-torture stance might be a political liability after all. I was beginning to lose hope. Also: there’s a new web-based tool you can use to determine whether or not you qualify for the earned income tax credit, and if so how much you’ll get.; The I.R.S. will train you in the art of taking money from the government and giving it to poor families — for free. Also: maybe you heard about ExxonMobil’s record-breaking profits last year, but did you hear who really made out like a bandit?; While the IRS tries to convince the public that taxpaying is normal, expected behavior, the public notices that people in high places seem to think it’s quite optional. Also: Thoreau counsels a volunteer for the Crimean War.; Tax resisters may find some of the provisions of the current stimulus boondoggle to be useful. Here’s a list.; A whole buncha links: updates on the Peace Tax Seven, the U.S. torture policy, San Francisco’s Tea Party, E.I.T.C. fraud, the upcoming military budget, tax resistance during the Great Depression, underground economy as tax resistance, war tax resistance in the Basque country, getting creative with traditional-to-Roth IRA transfers, and when it comes to war crimes saying you were just following orders is no excuse (says Dubya).; I got my first letter from the I.R.S. this year… and a second letter the same day. One was surprising. Also: Ralph Shinaberry said if the government thinks it can tell him what and how much to grow on his farm, they might as well be the owners, and they can pay their own damn taxes. So the government auctioned off 1/264th of it.
How you can resist funding the government → the tax resistance movement → birth of the modern American war tax resistance movement → Ammon Hennacy: ▶; ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦; A 1948 edition of the journal MANAS gives a peek at the birth of the modern American war tax resistance movement. Also: Wendy McElroy on Thoreau’s “Civil Disobedience.” And: Democrats like Lieberman and Clinton think what this country needs is a bigger military.; Last month I kept track of every cent I spent. I’ve done this one-month-accounting for three years now. It confirms that my tax resistance strategy is sustainable and it also keeps my finger on the pulse of my economic well-being. And: Ammon Hennacy and Henry David Thoreau also took care to carefuly account for their expenses at times. It’s a shame that we’re so averse to paying attention to how we spend money.; I review Ammon Hennacy’s autobiography — The Book of Ammon.; Rushworth Kidder tries to define and develop moral courage in his book on the subject, but a whiff of sycophancy comes off the pages and spoils the project. Also: some advice on what to do if the I.R.S.’s private tax collection contractors come calling.; Examples of twenty-two ways tax resisters and their sympathizers have organized to support tax resisters and tax resistance campaigns.; An on-line movie celebrating the life and works of Ammon Hennacy and covering 20th century American anarcho-pacifism. Also: Utah Phillips on Ammon Hennacy.; A collection of tax-resistance-related pamphlets and other writing from the “one man revolution” of Ammon Hennacy.; Some excerpts from a 50-year-old pamphlet put out by The Catholic Worker concerning the tax refusal of Ammon Hennacy.; “All the world is queer save thee and me, and even thou art a little queer.” An episode from the life of “one man revolution” Ammon Hennacy.; Gandhi said it overwhelmed him; Ammon Hennacy said it had the answer to all of his questions; now here’s your opportunity to read Tolstoy’s “The Kingdom of God Is Within You.”; An in-depth look at the birth of the modern American war tax resistance movement, and the divisions it caused among the American pacifists of the War Resisters League.; The ethical escapologist wants to escape not just from the stultification of mainstream life, but from the moral burden of collaboration. Escapology is not evasion — not a denial of responsibility, but acceptance of it: both gratitude for the wider horizons of life it gives to us and acceptance of the project of living our values in the bounds of these new horizons.; I hunt through the Google news archives for bygone mentions of war tax resister Ammon Hennacy.; A search through the archives for more information about war tax resisters Art Harvey and Elizabeth Gravalos.; Some excerpts from the writings of Dorothy Day in “The Catholic Worker” on the subject of war tax resistance and resisters.; On this date in 1967, just a few days after Martin Luther King, Jr., delivered his powerful “Beyond Vietnam” speech, the Committee for Nonviolent Action wrote to to ask if King would publicly sign on to their war tax resistance campaign.; Dorothy DaPonte, Margaret Dungan, Kenneth Patton, Ned Richards, and George Yamada were among those in the first generation of modern American war tax resisters met by Ammon Hennacy in his travels. Also: a threatened tax strike in Cadillac, Michigan in 1961.; The revolution starts now, and you are the revolutionary. You don’t need an organization, a movement, or a majority. Join the “one man revolution — the only revolution that is coming.”; Some back-and-forth about my “one man revolution” post from last week, and some bits of interest that didn’t make the final cut.; The 30th Anniversary special edition of NWTRCC’s newsletter is now on-line. Also: Some more details about the tax resistance of conservative Utah governor J. Bracken Lee, and some examples of when Lee crossed paths with Christian anarchist tax resister Ammon Hennacy while Hennacy was running the Catholic Worker hospitality house in Salt Lake City.; If you don’t have any seizable property in your name, the government can’t seize it for back taxes. So holding resisters’ property in your name is a way non-resisters can help resisters resist. Here are some examples.; Pickets and other such public demonstrations commonly accompany tax resistance campaigns. Here are some examples that caught my eye.; The lesser-known of two large public rosters of war tax resisters during the Vietnam War, and some other artifacts from the American war tax resistance movement circa 1967.
Miscellanous tax resisters → individual war tax resisters → Fred Ecks: ▶; ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦; Fred X writes in to talk about his own experiences in tax resistance through living below the tax line. Also: the old “5th Amendment” tax protester argument could get a new hearing if the I.R.S. goes through with its plan to allow the justice department access to its records.; A new I.R.S. policy may make things difficult for tax resisters who try to use their W-4 forms to keep taxes from being withheld from their paychecks. Also: Fred Ecks notes that spending money in alignment with your values requires actually knowing how you’re spending your money.; The I.R.S. may start turning over some of its delinquent accounts to private debt collection agencies as early as this month. Also: Russell Kanning’s sentencing hearing is moved up to next week. And: what effect does socially-responsible stock picking actually have on the world outside of the stock exchange?; I expand The Picket Line’s collection of Thoreau’s writing on political philosophy with excerpts from his journals and from “A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers”. Also: a tax resister looks forward to filing his return.
Miscellanous tax resisters → individual war tax resisters → Jeff Knaebel: ▶; ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦; Happy tax day! Here’s an audio interview with Ed Hedemann, and info on tax resisters Karl Meyer, Timothy Godshall, Carol Rose, Joanna Karl, and Jeff Knaebel.; Tax resister and renunciate Jeff Knaebel echoes a position previously held by Alexander Solzhenitsyn and Leo Tolstoy — the first commandment of fighting tyranny: thou shalt not give false witness. Is this true, or is there a place for the sniggler and the framing spinmeister?; The Picket Line commemorates an important anniversary with some vintage rhetoric and a bunch of links.; An update on the Schwieberts attempt to persuade the United Methodist Church to help them resist an I.R.S. levy. Also: tax resister Jeff Knaebel addresses an International Conference on Global Conflicts and Terrorism in Pune, India.; Taxpatriate satyagrahi Jeff Knaebel has a book out, and a website that he hopes will help like-minded folks join together as they walk in the footsteps of Gandhi, Tolstoy, and Thoreau.; Sunday browsing bits & pieces: Opting out of the money economy, leaving the sinking ship of a nation-state, and giving an red-white-and-blue homecoming to a war hero.; Ralph DiGia, old-school anti-war activist who persuaded the War Resisters League to support the war tax resistance of its employees, dead at 93. Also: some notes from expatriate renunciate satyagrahi Jeff Knaebel.; Don Schrader lives simply (and strangely) in pursuit of ethical living (and generates plenty of interest); war tax resisters in Colorado Springs make the news; the I.R.S. refuses to cough up its audit statistics despite a court order; expatriate tax resister Jeff Knaebel speaks at the Gandhi Sixtieth Memorial in Pune; and Larry Rosenwald wonders if the emphasis on voluntary simplicity means that tax resisters with voluntarily complex lifestyles aren’t welcome in the clubhouse.; Jeff Knaebel examines the sort of relationship an ethical person should have with a government, using the framework of Thich Nhat Hahn’s socially engaged Buddhism. Also: libertarians debate civil disobedience and the possibility of geographically diffuse, agorist splinter economies that compete with the State without confronting it directly. And: anti-war activists may be having more success than they know. Also: Wendy McElroy shares her “frugalista” philosophy. And: Vermonters are encouraged to seceed from the Union before Vermont does. Also: corruption and graft in wanton disregard for the safety of U.S. troops amongst American war profiteers? Who’d have guessed?; The People’s Life Fund redirects $10,000 of war tax resisters’ money from the federal government to local charities. Also: the I.R.S. oversight board thinks the agency should use a M.A.D.D. or M.P.A.A.-like propaganda campaign to get people to comply with taxation. And Jeff Knaebel suggests tax resistance as a way of reclaiming your right to pursue an ethical life.; In Lillian Schlissel’s book “Conscience in America” is an excerpt from a letter to the Pennsylvania Assembly from 1795 that I haven’t been able to find elsewhere, and the author of which remains unknown to me, but that attempts to explain the Quaker refusal to pay militia exemption fines. Also: some advice from taxpatriate satyagrahi Jeff Knaebel.; John Bisceglia discusses his tax resistance campaign for same-sex marriage legal recognition on Strictly Confidential radio. Also: Jeff Knaebel writes about resisting taxes on the way toward a society of love and reason.; The government responds to a would-be tax resister by auditing her and then giving her a refund. Also: more on long-term tax resisting dentist Thomas Wilson. And: tax provisions of note in the recent bailout bill. Also: anti-war port blockaders in Olympia, Washington avoid prosecution but might get hit by SLAPP suits. And: a widespread tax strike hits Tehran’s bazaar. Also: taxpatriate Jeff Knaebel meditates on political freedom and satyagraha.; The conspiracy to discredit war tax resister Archbishop Raymond Hunthausen, a property tax strike in Chicago in 1977, information about Australian war tax resister Robert Burrowes, memories of Mennonite war tax resister Benny Bargen, and Jeff Knaebel on war and taxes. Also: Was Saint Hugh of Lincoln a 12th century conscientious war tax resister?; Taxpatriate satyagrahi Jeff Knaebel has a new quest and a new website. Also: Washington wants you to invest your 401(k)s and IRAs in government bonds and has begun floating ideas on how to force you to do so. And: An obituary for long-time war tax resister George Willoughby. Also: another tax resistance campaign in Argentina.; Suffragists in France organize a campaign of tax resistance in 1931. Also: Gandhian taxpatriate Jeff Knaebel died from deliberate self-immolation in India last month.; One tactic tax resisters have used from time to time is to pack up and leave when the tax collector comes calling, or when arrest is imminent. Also: the tale of James F. Hathaway, who won tax concessions by threatening to go Galt in 1897.

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