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Questionable Tax Deductions
by Harry Reasoner CBS News
for a cup of coffee?” “Certainly. But I’m afraid I’ll have to ask for a receipt.” Doesn’t sound quite right, does it? But it seems we’ll just have to get used to it. There is a small escape clause in the new regulation, provided you are a regular churchgoer. The tax agency will allow all God-fearing citizens to deduct one dollar a week for church contributions. This means that regular churchgoers will be able to deduct an additional $52 a year. Only, there’s a catch. You’re going to have to submit a record of your attendance at weekly "services and the record must be signed by your pastor, who soon no doubt will be giving over a good portion of his sermon time to calling the roll. It’s not that the Internal Revenue Service thinks there’s an y th in g wrong with the Biblical admonition to “ render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and to God the things that are God’s” ; it just wants to make sure that Caesar’s getting his share.
panhandler. And, traditionally, the act of giving is supposed to be a magnanimous one, a noble gesture of faith with no strings attached. In short, one of the few remaining acts of selfless heroism still avail able to us all. As the late Sergeant Alvin York discovered, however, the Internal Revenue Service knows no heroes. If the tax collectors have their way, the day of the nickel on the Salvation Army drum, the dollar in the church collection basket, and the casual corner handout is over. Up to now, the taxpayer could conveniently deduct his charity giv ing without going into details. But those carefree days are no more. From here on in, the government will let you give away $26 a year and no questions asked. But any charity donations over that figure will have to be carefully docu mented. This could lead to some unlikely scenes. For example, there might be this sort of dialogue: “ Buddy, could you spare a dime
I T is A f a c t of human nature that we don’t like to think about the unpleasant: the Internal Revenue Service, for example. At best we can only give that about one painful thought a year. On the other hand, the people who run the Internal Revenue Service are thinking about us all of the year. April 15th may still be a depress ing yesterday to most of us, but the tax people are already busy laying plans for next year’s reckoning. Nat urally the plans include some tricky new wrinkles. You see, the Internal Revenue Service believes that honesty is the best policy. Only they aren’t con vinced that anybody else believes it. So every year they think up new ways to keep the taxpayer out of sin —and possibly jail. This time they’ve come up with a couple of beauties. Now, the average American is by nature a generous soul who annually gives countless sums to everything from national and local charities and religious and social organizations to the sidewalk
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OCTOBER, 1965
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