Big Brother Marches On: Grassley and Baucus Version

We also mentioned THIS earlier.

It is easily one of the most onerous burdens on business which has EVER been passed.

Should cause a revolt, actually...

The massive expansion of requirements for businesses to file 1099 tax forms that was hidden in the 2,409-page health reform bill took many by surprise when it came to light last month.

...The 1099 changes attached to the health care reform bill... massively expand the requirements for filing the "1099-Misc" form

...All business payments or purchases that exceed $600 in a calendar year will need to be accompanied by a 1099 filing. That means obtaining the taxpayer ID number of the individual or corporation you're making the payment to -- even if it's a giant retailer like Staples or Best Buy -- at the time of the transaction, or else facing IRS penalties

Oh, yes, that will be a burden.

"Just with business travel it would include hotels, rental cars," Henschke says. "Phone service: 1099. Computer service: 1099. Whoever does your postage meter: 1099. You do a little advertising, Yellow Pages: 1099. Your landlord: 1099. You might as well just keep them in your pocket and hand them out as you go around every day."

And, of course, each 1099 a business RECEIVES must be entered on its 1040.

How do we know that this will be unpopular?

No one is willing to take credit for introducing the new legislation, which appeared in the Senate Finance Committee's version of the health bill last fall. Committee chairs Don Baucus, D-Mont., and Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, both referred calls to committee staffers, who wouldn't comment on the record.

Grassley and Baucus should be held in a manure-pit until they "remember" who made this happen.

They pose for holy pictures and yammer about a "$345Bn tax gap"--an assertion made without any proof other than statistical projections by IRS.

You want to fix a "tax gap", boys?

Go patrol the southern border and start collecting excise taxes on the drug shipments.