Relative to the world's other advance democracies, Americans get off easy on tax day. Of the 35 richest countries, the U.S. ranks 32nd in total tax burden.

If you get rid of all these giveaways and loopholes and deductions and credits, then you can sharply lower the rates.

We cut tax exemptions in 1986, it was the most admired tax reform in U.S. history. Congress and the president worked together then to eliminate scores of loopholes and exemptions and deductions; this made taxes much simpler, and allowed a major cut in tax rates.

It used to be that we taxed property - zapped farmers basically. And there were very rich people who didn't pay that much tax. So in 1913, they put in the income tax. It was incredibly popular. The tax we love to hate today.

There's a tradeoff. Yeah, I lose the deduction that I really like, but my tax rate is going to go down, and I don't have to fill out that form anymore. It's much simpler, rates are lower, and that tradeoff has worked in many countries. Many countries have just cleaned house of all those exemptions in order to provide lower rates, and people buy it.

President Trump repeatedly says that "America is the highest-taxed country in the world." This is an alternative fact. We pay less in taxes, and our government spends less, as a share of our total wealth, than our counterparts in Western Europe and East Asia. But Trump is right when it comes to corporate tax rates; the U.S. corporate income tax right is among the highest in the world.

Our tax code becomes so absurdly complex every 32 years that we have no choice but to scrap it and re-write. The 32-year period is up in 2018. So the time has come. History tells us that we're going to produce a fairer, simpler tax code by 2018.