"You failed to mention the congressional hearings a couple years ago where the IRS was called to task on their strong arm tactics involving taxpayers.

Seems I remember congress told them they had better shape up."

******That's an interesting statement, Gary. What does that have to do with whether or not the man in the story actively tried to comply with our existing laws and protect his company? After seeing your response, I went back and re-read the original story and nowhere does it mention what actions the man took in order to prevent the problem? Nowhere in the original story is it stated the government gave the man misinformation. The point of the story seemed to be the-government-is-out-to-screw-us and my response was the-government-doesn't-screw-us-as-much-as-we-screw-ourselves-so-exercise-your-legal-right-to-be-informed-and-do-your-homework-in-order-to-protect-yourself-and-your-business. (Geez, it's hard to type a hyphen between every word!!!)

Our principles of government and the actual government worker bees and law makers aren't perfect. You'll get no argument from me on that one! :) But they can hardly be deemed responsible for the choices WE make. Like I said before, the government can't compel someone to seek information. If the government were given that right, we'd be whining about how they've taken away our freedom to be stupid and uneducated. Also, the government shouldn't be held responsible when someone **insists** on making bad/stupid decisions especially when that someone could have done a little bit of research and made much better decisions.

It's really very simple; we have laws/rules/procedures we must follow to be in compliance with the Law/reap the benefits of the Law. When we aren't in compliance with the Law because we failed to find out what the Law is, (and let's face it, how many business owners AREN'T aware we have laws regarding taxing businesses???) WE failed, not the government. On a similar note, when we don't find out what the Law is and we miss out on taking advantage of the many benefits which could be available to us, which are granted to us by Law, WE failed, not the government.

Now, if it turns out the man in the story exercised due diligence and sought information from his favorite tax paid public servants and they gave him misinformation THEN the government should be held responsible for the man making a bad decision regarding taxation of workers.

But so far, I haven't seen anything in the story to suggest the government did anything wrong in that particular situation. Of course, I left my secret decoder ring at home so maybe I'm missing an invisible message...... ;)

:)
EM