You are self employed make about 3000 a year do you need to pay taxes?

Answer 1

Yes, you should file a return. You probably will not owe any income tax, but you will be subject to self-employment tax of 15.3%. ANSWER:

If you need to pay taxes it is because you owe the tax. If you owe a tax it is because you were either made liable for that tax or you have accepted the liability on behalf of the person who was made liable for the tax. How much you've earned is irrelevant until you have been made liable for an income tax. What makes you liable? Are you involved in some sort of taxed activity that has clearly been named by the Internal Revenue Code as a taxed activity or is it your income being taxed directly that is the subject of this tax? The first question that should be asked in regards to any tax is what is the subject of the tax? What exactly is being taxed? If the subject of the tax is income then it is a direct tax upon your property. There are numerous lower court decisions that will quibble with my assertion and there are some real scary judges out there who are convinced that your income is not your property and that your labor is not owned by you. Any one who has even a basic understanding of the law knows this is quite simply not true. Your income is your property and you most certainly do own your own labor. If the subject of the "Personal Income Tax" is income then it is a direct tax governed by the rule of apportionment. Since the "Personal Income Tax" is an unapportioned income tax then it should be assumed that the tax is not a direct tax on property but instead is an indirect tax on some sort of taxed activity. The lower courts, once again will quibble with this assertion, some have even reinterpreted Supreme Court rulings, (Since they can't overturn a Supreme Court ruling.), in order to quibble over my assertion. I highly recommend you look at these Supreme Court rulings which have remained remarkably consistent since the 16th Amendment was first passed. However, reading case law is arduous and requires a certain knowledge of legal language. It is not necessary to study case law in order to understand the meaning and intent of the 16th Amendment. It certainly helps to know the history that led up to the enactment of the 16th Amendment but even with out historical context any person of average intelligence who understands the Constitution of the United States can discern the true meaning of this Amendment. I say true meaning because today most people who think they know something about the 16th Amendment, including a multitude of those lower court judges I mentioned, believe that the 16th Amendment relieved Congress of the rule of apportionment in regards to income taxation. This is not true and you can read the Amendment for yourself to first know the error of this assertion. The 16th Amendment states:

Congress shall have the power to lay and collect taxes on income, from whatever source derived, without apportionment among the several states, and without regard to any census of enumeration.

Many of those scary judges in the lower courts I keep to referring to will actually paraphrase the 16th Amendment in order to support their own assertions that this Amendment relieved Congress of the rule of apportionment and will mention how the 16th Amendment made this possible by authorizing an income tax "without regard to apportionment." Of course if you're still reading now then it's safe to assume you read the 16th Amendment and I don't need to tell you that this Amendment did not say anything about a disregard for apportionment. If this were the case the 16th Amendment would have been most certainly struck down as Unconstitutional since no Amendment can be created to erase or change any part of the original constitution. Congress can add to it as long as those additions or Amendments are harmonious with the Constitution itself. What the sixteenth Amendment does say is that an unapportioned income tax should be viewed without regard to census of enumeration. Census of enumeration is how Congress would levy a capitation if they could ever figure out how to successfully pass such a tax. No capitation tax has ever successfully passed legislation in the United States. If a capitation tax were to be passed it, like a tax on property, would be subject to the rule of apportionment. Are you beginning to understand? What the 16th Amendment is telling everybody is that if Congress passes an unapportioned income tax it should not be viewed as a direct tax but rather as an indirect tax where all income taxes inherently belong. Don't believe me? Then go find the necessary case law in Supreme Court rulings that make the same assertion. But do you really need to read case law in order to know that Congress can't change the Constitution by Amendment? Do you really need to spend countless hours wading through the 37,000,000,000 words of the Internal Revenue Code and Supreme Court rulings to know that 16th Amendment never named any subject of any tax? Congress did not gain any new power of taxation, nor was any new burden placed upon the people by the 16th Amendment. Congress has always had the power to lay and collect taxes from whatever source derived and do this as an unapportioned tax. These taxes are known as taxed activities in the case of such an income tax, income is not the subject of the tax as the taxed activity is the subject of the tax and income is merely what is used to decide how much is owed. If you are self employed and all you earned in a year was about 3000 dollars and since income is not the subject of the tax, then the big question becomes what did you do to earn that 3000 dollars? Is that activity specifically named by the Code? If the answer to that question is no, then the answer to your question is no.