lubab: "...As far as I can tell no constitutional amendment is required...I'm not sure where you're getting this from but I'd like to see some proof...
For "proof", you might first ask the IRS to present to you a law stating that you must file a yearly tax report, and pay Federal Income Tax to the IRS.
There will be no "proof", because there has never been such a law.
A constitutional amendment was required to abandon the laws for taxation stated in the Constitution of the United States of America and to substitute in their place a central bank (The Federal Reserve) and an enforcement agency (the IRS).
This is because the Constitution is The Supreme Law of The Land, and forbids (rightly so) any taxation on income derived from one's labor.
Only corporate income and a few other income tax liability categories are to be legally taxed according to the Founding Fathers.
In addition, our Constitution mandates only Congress with the power to issue currency, and clearly states that gold and silver are the backing of any money issued in the U.S.A.
Today, the 16th Amendment to the Constitution (apparently never legally ratified) was necessary to alter the nation's banking, currency, and taxation laws, by setting up The Federal Reserve Bank as the nation's central bank.
It is privately owned, and from its inception the ownership which directly profits from its establishment is secret and has never been revealed.
The Federal Reserve is not part of The Federal Government, and it prints fiat paper currency with no backing whatsoever, sells it to the banks of the Federal Reserve System, which then "loan" the currency to those capable of paying it back with interest.
This has resulted in an unsustainable economic structure in which actual wealth has been replaced with debt.
The banks own everyone's homes, cars, and businesses, until the loan which enabled them has been paid back in full plus interest.
The IRS also is outside of the Constitution, and serves as an illegal "police agency" with no government oversight whatsoever.
An American citizen possesses the "G-d given right" under the 5th Amendment not to be forced to incriminate themself, yet the IRS demands that everyone incriminate themself by filing a tax return, paying an illegal tax, and being subject to persecution, prosecution, and property confiscation; all with no authority whatsoever.
The IRS boasts that "the American federal income tax is the world's most successful 'voluntary' tax system", but when pressed to define the term 'voluntary', they've proffered the Orwellian reply that "Voluntary means that everyone fills out their own tax form" (and will be subject to arrest and imprisonment for not volunteering).
Few Americans know that their Federal Income Tax is used only for the purposes of paying off the increasing Federal debt incurred by borrowing money from other nations to support an out-of-control cost of an ever enlarging government.
Not one penny of our paid Federal Income Tax goes for military, education, infrastructure.
In other words, the Federal Government is accumulating an every larger unpayable debt with which to support itself, by borrowing money from our enemies like China and Saudi Arabia, and the average citizen is forced to support such a fraudulent system by having their personal incomes robbed.
The actual Owners of the Federal Reserve Bank, those "secret" guys whose names we're forbidden to know, all grow increasingly richer and wealthy from the profits of the Federal Reserve, all the while maintaining the Government and people in ever increasing debt.
The money required to maintain domestic civilization is totally derived from the State and Local taxes we all pay every day with every purchase we make, and with our yearly State Income Tax.
Therefore, any changes made to an already unconstitutional "tax code" without a full Constitutional Amendment, will be nothing more than a further erosion of Americans' Constitutional Rights, and a further abandonment of our Constitution.
