Tax Law and Accounting
Income tax is a part of the fiscal policy of our economy. The first federal income tax was imposed by Congress in 1862, to finance the waging of the Civil War. The Civil War income tax was repealed in 1872, but a new income tax was enacted as part of the 1894 Tariff Act. However, the Supreme Court struck down the income tax in 1895. It ruled that the portion of the income tax that applied to income on property was a direct tax that, under the United States Constitution, could not be levied without apportioning the tax by population. In 1913, the states ratified the Sixteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, which made possible modern income taxes (Taxation).
The sources of the modern income tax statutes are court decisions, case law, legislation, constitutional provisions, and international taxation laws. Objectives of the income tax statutes are to raise resources for the government, to reduce the inequalities of income in the economy, to promote the balanced development, and to give thrust to the strategic sectors of the economy for economic development (Pope, Anderson, and Kramer).
If the economy is in recession, then the tax credit and tax cuts will increase the disposable income and thus increase the overall production of the economy. It will help in recovery of the economy. But one has to take care that increase in the disposable income should not be wasted on the conspicuous expenditure but utilized for the essential consumption expenditure. Then only it can lead to increase in the employment, which will lead to increase in real growth in national income. If the economy is overheated then the reverse strategy can be employed.
Other changes to fiscal policy should be simultaneously pursued, that would have ...