For a tax plan that extols simplicity, Rick Perry's essentially redefines the concept.
Good lord, what a mess. It's flat, but optional; it's more fair, but grossly advantageous to the wealthy; it's innovative, but as banal as Arthur Laffer; it's a federal-revenue pleaser, but it's a larger deficit-bomb; it's a serious thrust in the GOP debate, and it's an absolute fucking joke.
As WaPo's Dylan Matthews, of Wonkblog, points out, Perry's plan "eliminates two of the flat tax’s main selling points." Namely, it ain't simple at all -- indeed, it complicates nearly everyone's tax strategy (except mine, which consists of earning as little as possible, thus taxes aren't even an annoyance); and second, "By offering the choice not to pay the flat tax, Perry’s plan results in a more limited shift toward taxing consumption," which many economists tend to prefer, since consumption taxes "encourage investment and discourage consumption-based bubbles."
The better part of his plan, though, is still to come: that is, watching Rick Perry attempt to explain it -- extemporaneously -- to the press and during upcoming debates. Then we'll see true "simplicity," of the mind, re-redefined.