Somebody PLEASE Help me! (legal tax matter)

I heard this yesterday from a preacher friend of mine and I want to know if anyone can tell me if it's true!

When a person is a member of a church and he or she tithes and gives the church 10% of their income, do they REALLY get a tax write off at the end of the year for the money they give the church and does that person Really then get all that money back? Are ALL the taxpayers(you and me)really the ones in the end, who support the fundie churches that supported BUSH? What I mean is, if a man gives 10% of a million bucks to the church, does he dodge paying ten percent of his income taxes to the feds, while we keep getting gouged more and more to pay for the Federal Government's expenses, while the church going tax dodgers get out of paying their fair share?

I mean, we know that every time someone avoids(shirks or cheats)their fair share, that taxes go up for everyone who earns an income to make up that difference, right?

Anybody?

Edit} I was SHOCKED to hear this! I've been pissed ever since!

so basically your reduce your tax burden by 30% of what you give, right?

for tax purposes. If you itemize your deductions charitable donations will reduce your Adjusted Gross Income. As a result you pay tax on a lower amount. It is not a dollar for dollar reduction like a tax credit. The amount of the tax benefit depends upon your tax bracket. After about $130,000 of AGI the ability to take those deductions begins to phase out.

if this kind of thing were tracked down to those churches, where the leaders of those churches stood up in front of the congregation and told ALL the members to vote for Bush, would that person be accountable? The motive being, that under Bush the likelihood of their or their churches tax exempt status would be protected!

I know of one church here where the pastor makes $200,000 a year!

told the congregation to vote for Bush, they put their tax exempt status in jeopardy. A church is not allowed to advocate for candidates. It should be reported to the IRS. Once the tax exempt status is lost, the donors can no longer take deductions for their contributions.

A donation to a church (generally acceptend as a 501(c)(3) charity) is tax deductable. Thus, a person who contributes money to them may take a deduction which would result in a mitigation of taxable income by the amount of the deduction times the marginal rate of tax. Assuming a 28% marginal rate of income, a $1,000 contribution to a church would reduce a persons final tax by $280.

right?

it is 280 that we or our children will pay later - along with those current taxes which will also be due.

Under my March of Dimes example, if I didn't give the $1000.00 to the March of Dimes, the government would have to make that up (in theory). Instead, the government is only "losing" $280.00 as opposed to the $1000.00. My charitable deduction saved the taxpayer $720.00. In theory.

and congress would make up the difference for the March of Dimes work. No indication that unless there is a buck to be made for their cronies that this would be the case.

But the idea is that it is a small subsidy to get people involved in charity. So much of the tax code is about steering behavior.

If you want to see a right-winger's head explode remind him that we taxpayers are subsidizing their homebuying by providing federal tax deductions for both the state property tax paid and the interest paid on the mortgage. I wrote a LTTE on this one time and you should have heard the spluttering - "but, but, but, it is my money not the government's blah, blah, blah, I work hard for my house and I don't want my taxes to go up to provide any lowcost housing for the lazy poor folks blah, blah, blah."

advocated voting for * and go after their tax exempt status.

For almost four years, some have been preaching the party line: "If you don't support the war, you're unpatriotic, unChristian, etc." I spoke to a lady who was very upset over that two years ago.

They have also been teaching that it is the duty of Christians to "support our leadership", etc. etc.

For several years, some congregations have been captive audiences three times a week to these messages being sprinkled throughout traditional sermons.

Forget about churces for a second and consider the March of Dimes. If I donate $1000.00. I can reduce my taxable income by $1000.00. So, if I make $100,000, I am now only paying taxes on $99,000.

For arguments sake let's make the tax rate a flat 28 percent (which it is not but I don't want to explain tax policy). Instead of paying $28,000.00 in taxes, I am now paying $27,720.00.

Of course, I can do the same thing with interest on my home.

I hear charitable organizations are not raking in the bucks they were, before the tax cuts! Also Bush is now giving federal funds to charitable organizations! Is that because the fat cats stopped giving and so now the taxpayers are all taking up the slack? Bush is saving his political hide with the charitable organizations, at the lower income earner's expense?

Bush didn't just make up the charitable deduction.

for ALL he can get out of it!

Maybe we should start sending little notes to the churches letting them know that their congregations are subsidizing our contributions to sinners and heathens.

Do you think that would get a raise out of them.

But a chunk out of their pocketbook might! Seems like the preachers say dollar a hundred times, to every one time they say Love anymore!

But there has been an accusation of a scam in Canada where kickbacks have been alleged.

http://www.fpp.co.uk/online/99/05/PresseMontreal060599.html

I'll bet that same kind of thing goes on here too, and probably is really common place! So many ways for the churches to scam the taxman! The GOPers would never crack down on anything the churches do! Most of the dems on the hill would turn a blind eye too, but I think this in your face "Morals" thing of KKKarl's might get the ball rolling, later on down the line! The democratic party has taken some major hits from the fundies by not fighting back! It's doing a number on us for sure!