No corporation should receive a tax cut more than last year's. Anything more is traitorous to the American masses and shows again and again how crazy Trump is.
I'm gonna get drunk tonight, and tomorrow night, and the night after, but I promise I will stop drinking the night after that. So, can I have my chip now?
1
If this bill passes, the Republican party as we knew it is truly dead. RIP; never thought I'd miss the old GOP.
4
You certainly will! We won't have anything to watch on TV, and nothing exciting to discuss at work or parties; even at the dinner table. Gee, what will we do with or time?
I will personally commit to paying higher taxes if they are used to repair our nation's crumbling infrastructure. But I will not pay higher taxes to reward corporations that raked in $1.7 trillion in profits last year and reinvested none of it in jobs or higher wages. Anyone who votes for this tax bill deserves to be drummed out of Congress, and many of them will be come next year.
8
The interesting thing about business is that they don't pay taxes! Most people don't consider that in the discussion. Businesses that sell a product or service, include that tax in the selling price; it is part of the operating cost. Guess who is actually paying the tax?
Corporations are owned by people, or other corporations, that have invested money for stock in the company. The investor may be at any economic level; it is not just the so-called "fat cat" that owns stock. If you are in a 401k plan where you work, your money may be in stock and you want that stock to do well to help you in retirement. Perhaps you can find a few hundred to take to a financial services company and have them handle your investment, for a fee of course. Edward Jones Company is one among many in the financial business. If you are saving for retirement and don't want to risk losing the money, you can go to your local bank and may get a percent interest rate. Investing in stock comes with risk; you may have a good return on your investment, or you may lose your investment. Some plans have greater risk than others, but greater potential for a good return! The extremely wealthy can influence the stock price with their investments.
Either american corporations are put on an equal tax footing with the rest of the industrialized world, or the U.S. will continue to lose jobs to China and other tax friendlier countries. And corporations will continue to relocate their money and headquarters to tax friendlier countries such as Ireland, which is what my last employer did when they moved there 5 years ago. t's simple economics,not rocket science. Without corporations and the jobs they provide, our country will cease to exist. Maybe that's what Democrats, liberals and progressives really want.
2
When was the last time you looked at average effective corporate tax rates for US businesses? They're generally in line with those in other developed nations. Some on the Right have cited the highest corporate rate, which few companies pay. As for those with whom you disagree wanting the nation to "cease to exist," I don't think you actually believe that. In any case, what we do or don't want doesn't support your case for cutting corporate taxes, does it? https://www.cbpp.org/research/federal-tax/actual-us-corporate-tax-rates-...
Corporations and high net worth individuals are already piling up huge amounts of cash, much of it offshore. They are not spending what they already have pouring in.
Why on earth does anyone think that adding more money to the piles that are already sitting unspent (or spent frivolously on stock buy-backs and mergers) will accomplish anything useful?
Meanwhile those with medical problems, teachers, homeowners, university students, and those in states that work to address the issues of their populations rather than exploit them will be tasked to pay for this gift to the least deserving group in the country.
Appalling!
9
It will successfully be blamed on the feckless Democrats, who do now know how to fight the Republicans- They play by 'nice' rules- Perhaps it is time to be tough!
1
They don't have the voting numbers to play tough. Elect a different Congress in2018!!
The irony is that a big part of these business tax cuts will end up being passed on to shareholder who are not US citizens. Trump is not just doing a "deal" for his rich American friends, he's also handing over tens of billions (or is it hundreds of billions) to the richest people in the world outside the US (Russian oligarchs, Chinese billionaires, Mexican tycoons, etc).
Trump will have lots of rich friends in the world who owe him "favors" after this tax cut. My guess is that he has always wanted to go from a few billion dollars to over ten billion. Just watch as this happens very quickly after he returns to civilian life. No one, of course, will be surprised.
3
Given this quote form the article, defending the U.S. as some form of democracy as opposed to some form of plutoligarchy requires a real convoluted argument. Granted it's more polite than say Russia. After all, the money doesn't go directly to them but to their campaign. But the difference in policy outcomes is neither polite nor subtle.
"The Koch network was instrumental in defeating a proposal from House Republican leaders earlier this year — known as border adjustment — that would have raised additional revenue by taxing imports. Eliminating that provision was a central focus of the network’s semiannual donor retreat in Colorado over the summer; officials there warned that it would drag on economic growth."
If there are those insisting that a 35% corporate tax rate is too high but a 20% rate will produce a cornucopia of economic benefits, then fight for a uniform corporate tax rate of 20%, that is, a flat tax. Then, patriotically attach criminal penalties to diversions of income from unreasonable deductions, to be fought over and defined, and transfers of revenues destined only to avoid but redefined as evading taxes.
1
Curious if anyone knows if the change making the full cost of tuition grants and reductions taxable income for University employees and grad students automatically requires this income to be included in the social security and Medicare taxes. All of the calculations I have seen suggest that it is not being counted in the extra burden to be imposed--but all of the other kinds of "extra" income included from your employer like overtime and year end bonuses do count as Social Security and Medicare income. This would also substantially increase the cost of the Tuition grant to Universities, who would be required to pay the employer share of social security on all tuition grants.
Will student athletes also be required to pay tax and SS and Medicare on the value of their scholarships, or is it just those with an "employee" relationship?
Rushing the bill without scrutiny seems to be an absolute guarantee of many unintended or unremarked consequences. Yesterday's 1.4 trillion dollar loophole found by a professor will certainly be fixed. However, flaws found by tax attorneys will be held silently until it is too late to repair. How many trillion dollar "flaws" are in this as yet unseen bill?
2
Another Trump campaign promise turns out to have been a lie. Trump promised to remove the carried interest loophole. The Senate bill did not remove it, and Trump remained silent. Democrats offered an amendment to eliminate this loophole. The amendment was rejected on a party line vote in which Republicans provided all the votes against it. Trump said nothing.
This was the Mitt Romney loophole -- the one that permitted him to pay a lower rate on his millions than many middle class people pay on their 40 or 50 thousand.
Senator Inhofe just branded the assault on this loophole and others to be "class warfare."
1
The Republican “Party”is nothing more than a criminal enterprise that has profiting off of the country as it’s main goal.
While the people have elected “representatives” to do what is best for the country, these people are using their positions to benefit themselves.
This is criminal.
They control all three branches of government now, and don’t care what the people think.
1
Why is a president so close to indictment and disapproved of by nearly 60% of the citizenry permitted to sign this nefarious legislation? Obviously the founders could not foresee every crisis that would befall the nation.
1
Please, sink this bill!
What I see is an attempt to impoverish the middle class, remove any remaining safety nets for the poor, and further enrich the rich. We will be plunged into a situation not unlike the early 1930's.
The reason they are fighting so hard to plummet the corporate tax rate to 20% is because they are, at the same time, asking to make this PERMANENT. If you are a greedy old man hoping to leave your pile of blood money to your useless offspring, this is exactly the kind of thing you would want to defend with everything you've got.
Moreover, this will surely weaken our government in likewise PERMANENT way. Once they have gutted the government, and changed all of the laws to ensure that the government remains weak, there is absolutely nothing that protects us from the corporations. Nothing.
1
All this from the party that complained unceasingly for 8 years about the national debt under Obama.
2
I said this before and i say it again. Congress: Pass this bill and you will be looking for new jobs come 2018,2020,
On second thought. Pass this bill and we will be, by the hundreds of thousands, descend upon D.C. with pitchforks.
Having a red line of 20% as a negotiating strategy is okay in my book (it certainly beats having a no use of chemical weapons one with Assad that you then ignore), but the real key is what you do if at the end of this process, you can either accept something like 22-23% or you can have our current tax rates. Some tea parties would rather die than compromise, but my guess is that Trump and Cohn will deal. McConnell and Ryan certainly will.
Given the very real cloud now hanging over Trump's head, thanks to Flynn's plea bargain with the Mueller investigation, this horrific travesty of a bill should not be put on his desk even if passed. He should have no legal right to enact ANYTHING from the Oval Office, and everything he has done should be nullified at once.
3
Either the GOP is stuck in the 1980s, before the world started changing so quickly or maybe that's just what they want us to think. The rest of the world has moved on, folks.
Politics is local.
Business is global.
Why pretend that our local laws will entice business to invest here if it is not made a requirement of the tax law? If business owners can find a cheaper way to make a product, they will do just that. So, unless we can provide cheaper labor, those jobs will be created wherever business owners/CEOs believe they will make the most profit. Today, that's Asia; 20 years from now it could be Africa. If the cost of making the product plus transporting that product to market is less than making it closer to the market, the profit seekers will go with the cheaper labor.
The CEOs have already told us they are not going to use any extra money to create jobs here; they will put that money in stockholders' pockets or to buy back stock. Even those who might invest capital in the U.S. are looking at robotics to minimize labor expense.
So, just what is the goal of Trump and the GOP in this tax bill? Do they actually believe the lower taxes will offset the higher cost of labor in our nation? Do they think businesses will invest here because of national fervor?
Maybe they believe that in 10 years the cost of doing business here will be on an equal basis with the rest of the world and manufacturing will come back in time to make up the deficits created.
If a tax break for corporations would actually help the lower and middle class, I think we could all accept it. But how many corporations even pay 20% now? With all the avenues for complex corporate tax shelters available to them, not many of the big ones. And where would these supposed tax savings go? To give employees a raise? Hire new workers when we're at full employment and some industries are already begging for employees? No, it would go to shareholders, upper management, stock buybacks, etc. Investing in capital projects is time-consuming and risky, and funded with debt. This corporate tax cut will benefit the very few who are already sitting pretty.
In that for profit companies exists to make cutting the races on corporate profits make tremendous sense to me. If we want to collect more taxes elsewhere how about raising taxes on investment income. That way the profits are taxed when U. S. citizens or entities receive investment income.
Corporations generate massive tax revenue even if they don't pay a dime in corporate income tax because a great deal of payroll money goes to payroll and income taxes of the employees.
Shifting taxes to investment income would mean we would only be taxing the investors that pay U. S. income tax, but in my view that is a small price to pay for increased labor demand, higher salaies, and more people earning pay checks who had Benn collecting safety net income.
The theory advanced by proponents of the proposed tax cuts is that they will stimulate the economy, increase employment,, improve incomes across the full income range. and that the GDP increases resulting from the cuts will produce higher tax collections sufficent to pay for the cuts.
Of course the wealthy, the high income earners, the 1% and the corporations will have the benefit of the cuts whether or not this occurs.
What is needed to fix this is a provision in the tax bill to increase taxes if the deficit does balloon. Give the beneficiaries of the cuts some skin in the game. They are said to be the drivers of economic growth, so lets see them do it.
1
The tax bill will explode the deficit, raise taxes on low and middle class families, remove the health care mandate thus destabilizing healthcare and cause over 13 million to lose healthcare, provide new tax havens, give ungodly wealth to the already wealthy and their families, shrink resources from entitlement programs and investment which help the poor, aged, veterans and the disabled, and allow Hedge fund financiers to pay less taxes than the average secretary. It soaks the poor in favor of the rich. Particular elements benefit the Trump family and family businesses BIGLY, its a grab bag for the wealthy, taking from the poor to give to the rich. I'm all for reform, but it should be fair and equitable. Currently many businesses don't pay anything and the boon to business doesn't trickle down to worker's wages. Average workers haven't seen a raise to their incomes in decades, but those at the top are always making sure the few, over the many, are very well paid.
2
The Republican tax plan is not "tax reform" though they have labeled it as such. What it is, is huge tax cuts for the wealthy and crumbs for everyone else.
Why don't the Democrats present a real tax reform plan? In other words, "This isn't tax reform; it's a giveaway to those who already have millions. Let's tax all income, instead of exempting the kinds of income only the rich can get - that's fair. Let's get rid of all the cleverly designed loopholes that million-dollar tax attorneys can use so the rich don't pay the taxes we were told they'd pay." Then if this "make the rich richer" tax bill does pass this week, Democrats in November, 2018 can run on an alternative which will help the vast majority of people who are not millionaires.
Republicans are using Trump and his anti-Mexican, anti-Muslim, anti-Obama outbursts to hide their true goal from the majority of Americans. Their goal is to permanently empower the very, very rich. Don't let them do it!
7
One problem with a well thought-out and reasonable tax reform bill is that one would need time to research and debate. Hard to do while the Republicans are trying to pull off a midnight heist. And given past history, if the dems propose it, the repubs will not let it see light of day.
2
I'm okay with a 20% corporate tax rates as long as they actually pay the full 20%. It's not fair that some of the largest, most profitable corps pay little to no taxes or hide such a large amount of profits/assets that they only pay taxes on a small portion of earnings. Meanwhile, those of use who own incorporated small businesses, in which we must work extremely hard just to make a living, pay our full tax rates, which makes it even harder to compete in an economy dominated by large companies.
And lets not forget all the local and state tax incentives thrown at large companies. Small business are driven into bankruptcy every day, and throughout this entire tax reform debate, I've yet to hear anyone mention that fact and how these tax cuts will help level the playing field for small to midsize companies.
10
Large multinationals are still going to book their income in low or no tax jurisdictions -- places with taxes less than 20% are better than those with a 20% rate. The only difference is that they can now "repatriate" their income without paying US tax. Under the current system, any "repatriation" would be subject to US taxes less a complex method of granting credit for foreign taxes paid.
Trump and many Republicans are so greedy they are endangering their own tex bill. They could raise the corporate rate to 22% and solve their budgetary problems, but no, they have to steal money from graduate students, children and seniors to get it down to their larcenous limit.
We are being robbed. blind.
41
Is there an economist anywhere who can validate the criticality of 20% vs. 22% as a threshold for making "trickle down" succeed or fail? Apparently not. There must be a virus going around Washington that causes those infected to lie incessantly, and its source was trump.
22
Trickle down has never worked and never will (except in theory). Look at the economy of Kansas is a great example of failed trickle down economics in action. Corporate tax cuts don't create jobs.
Per Warren Buffett: “I have yet to see” anyone “shy away from a sensible investment because of the tax rate on the potential gain.”
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/10/09/opinion/corporate-tax-cuts-entreprene...
"But Mr. Trump has drawn what the White House calls a red line in negotiations at a rate of 20 percent, putting Republicans in something of a box."
You've got to be kidding. Trump will sign anything and call it a win.
14
Every decent American wants to pay higher taxes so that Corporations pay less.
Right?
27
Hahah exactly. I lived through the Reagan years, the Bush years, and the years of the horrible financial crisis. All created by cuts in taxes and regulations. By morons. Who then benefitted while the rest of us scrounged.
Decent Americans no longer count.
With the national debt something like twenty trillion dollars, doesn’t it make sense to leave the taxes as they are now and begin to pay down this debt? We aren’t in a position to afford a tax cut when we are in debt as deeply as they say. When we start to run a surplus will be the time to have a tax cut. And even then, maybe we should consider what happened the last time we ran a surplus.
32
I read some time ago of one economist who considered the deficit unimportant but couldn't understand his reasoning. He said that comparing the country's economics with that of an individual was not relevant. Perhaps that is how Republicans view both deficit and debt.
Why worry about the debt now?
Obama doubled it during his Presidency.
Be fair, Mr. Paper. Bush Jr's puppetry wholly destroyed the beautiful work Clinton did with the deficit. One would think that having Russia's near bankruptcy as an example would have kept Bush (and US) out of Afghanistan, not to mention Iraq, but oh no...American money well spent to appease corporate interests and to further build up the military industrial complex.
Obama was neutered in his Presidency by a do-nothing Republican Congress. That is fact, pure and simple. Read up a bit before you spout off.
Here is how I see envision this article: The head hog squeals for the rest to hurry up, stop thinking, and just jump into the fire.
5
Whaddya know, the Republicans are having difficulty passing a long promised piece of legislation and the president isn’t making matters easier!
5
Cut the pork from the federal budget! Eliminate redundacies and waste! Raising taxes to hide waste must stop! The new tax plan will result in a major reduction in the work of IRS employees; how many will go?
1
If we eliminated every dime of spending on anything other than defense and mandatory programs like medicare, social security, medicaid and interest on the debt it would not be enough to cover even the current annual deficit, let alone pay down on existing debt. And this bill will raise existing annual deficits. So get ready for cuts to social security, medicare and medicaid.
Bill, you have been reading too many Fox bumper stickers. Reality awaits when you come to your senses!
What are you smoking? I hope it's legalized marijuana. IRS employees are still going to have to process many complicated individual and business tax returns. Monitoring the new territorial tax system will require many person-hours of labor.
Business will always find a way to make money, it just should not be though taxpayer bailouts.
3
Trump picked a number: 20%. He sat in a room with a bunch of people and picked a number. He has no depth of knowledge on economics or the role the corporate income tax plays in our overall economic machinery. He just liked how it sounded. 20% vs. 35%. When faced with the reality of how it blows up the deficit to give unneeded tax relief the wealthy he doesn't care. So, in the same way he doesn't care about anything else he probably doesn't care if 25% get's him the same result. And less heat from right wing deficit hawks...20%...25%...what's the difference. After awhile you're talking about real money.
4
Why can’t they start by dropping the ridiculous estate tax repeal? After all Trump has already said he doesn’t benefit.
10
Donald Trump has no "red lines". That's a laughable assertion. Whatever talk he puts up about red lines is an act meant to add to the drama and increase ratings. He'll sign any bill he's given, call it a "great victory for the country" and then describe the new law in whatever terms he thinks will get him cheers from a crowd of people. None of what he'll say will be true, of course, but actually governing has never been the point for him. It's about feeding his ego; it's about finally feeling admired, respected. This is the biggest popularity contest of his life and he's determined to win it.
6
The GOP tax plan is wrong for many reasons:
1. The incestuous relationship between the top wealthy families and the wealthy Congressmen and Senators, through organized donations, interest groups and lobbyists for gamming the system to their advantages has gone too far. This incestuous relationship has been in play for decades. The GOP tax plan will result in the top wealthy families and their wealthy Congressmen and Senator lapdogs making further gains at the expense of the middle and lower income earners well into the future. The middle and lower income earners are not similarly organized and cannot present their interests. This is key to what’s at play here !!!
2. As an economist, I am horrified by the prospect of widening fiscal deficits if this GOP tax plan becomes law. This will result in government incurring additional debt to pay for expenses in all programs. This is an abrogation of responsible government which is to enact laws that would support all Americans, Responsible government is NOT to enact laws on taxes to the benefit of the wealthy minority at the expense of the middle and lower class majority. This is tyranny of the majority by the minority !!!
3. There is a general rule in economics and finance: You do not take on debt to finance consumption. Households or organizations take on debt to finance capital projects, not current expenses. To do so is to invite major financing problems, including possible bankruptcy, in future !!! Who will pay the bills ???
13
Maybe they could bring down the cost by firing all of Congress, the President, his worthless cabinet?
If that doesn't work, well, a couple billion removed from the uber-bloated military spending plan would hardly be missed.
8
What's the point of owning the Republican Party if the Kochs have to pay any state and Federal taxes?
6
I suspect Trump will hold this bill up until he's confident he is the single largest beneficiary of the tax cuts.
5
Hypocrisy rules again.
Republicans are usually the first to scream the loudest against anything that smacks of socialism, or worse, communism.
However, even the most conservative estimates show that this tax bill will balloon the federal deficit which will enlarge our nation's cumulative debt.
Guess who already owns the largest portion of our debt? China, followed closely by Japan.
According to the US Treasury Department (http://ticdata.treasury.gov/Publish/mfh.txt), China and Japan own $1.18 trillion and $1.09 trillion respectively. To put those numbers in context, that's about 35% of the $6.33 trillion owned by multiple other nations.
So, in order to make corporations and the wealthiest US Americans even richer, we are literally selling our democracy to the highest bidder.
3
Reality rears its ugly head. So now their brilliant “tax reform” might be to lower taxes now and raise them again later. That should be a loud signal to them that their “tax reform” doesn’t work. In fact, it doesn’t actually sound like “reform” at all. It sounds kind of like “we’ll give you $100 now and you can give us back $1,000 later.” What a deal!
By the way, is anyone else tired of hearing whining about how corporations need tax breaks? They already effectively pay less than 20%. So apparently 20% is really too harsh for them. Maybe we should remove corporate taxes completely. I’m sure we’d see business booming then. They would hire Americans instead of outsourcing, bring the factories back to the USA, give huge wage increases to all their employees, and donate any extra they have to our public education system and road departments. They would surely even donate excess profits to charities. They could start with the United States of America. We’re going to be badly in need of charity if our politicians keep playing this dangerous plutocratic game.
4
25% is not the 'golden kiss' Trump promised. And we know what an honorable and trustworthy man he is. Psst..there will be a settlement among the thieves.
1
If corporations now almost never pay the 35% of profits but actually only about 27% on average, thanks to all manner of deductions, credits, subsidies and loopholes maximized by creative structuring and bookkeeping and offshoring in shell companies and foreign subsidiaries, how much will they actually pay when the rate is lowered to 20%? Are they going to fire all their smart tax lawyers and CPAs since they no longer need to avoid taxes and will be happy paying 20% every year? Or will they continue to work the system and pay 15%, 12% or zero, as some hugely profitable huge corporations do now? Of course, since we don't have an actual bill with all the details laid out for experts to analyze, there is no way to know, is there?
3
Annie, you and I are on the same page. In fact, a couple years ago, Walmart actually got a $3.5B tax refund!!! With this tax cut to the rich & powerful, and corporate America, they'll ALL get tax refunds. And none of it will go to new jobs or employee salary increases (as they promised). NOPE! It all goes into three slices of the pie: to shareholder payments, executive compensation, and offshore accounts (in Panama?).
1
This bill is a mess. It reflects the messy minds of Republicans who have little interest in the middle class. And where are the provisions to close corporate loopholes for stashing money off shore?
3
In a classic real estate ploy Trump demands a 20% corporate tax rate but all along he knows he really would consider a higher rate a win for him. His concession would make him the most compromising President in American history saving the day for his middle class constituents.
I am just about ready to give up as the stupidity of our legislators and the Americans who vote for them is going to bust our nation.
3
Those Republicans sure can track endangered animals.
Trump Jr. got his elephant tail,
and now an extremely rare "it pays for itself" unicorn has been spotted
in the wilds of the smoke-filled room.
No surprise the photos are blurry.
3
This is merely an observation without a prescription: American politicians have used the tax code as a political football for decades. The result is a Frankenstein code stitched and cobbled together into a shambolic mess only to be repeatedly taken back into the lab where additional parts are stitched on and other parts excised. And on and on.
Here in Canada, and I'll assume most other western democracies, this sort of thing doesn't happen. At least not anywhere near the extent that is the uproarious politicking of the American way.
13
Trump has a crystal clear record on business matters. Say anything you can, no matter how untrue, to borrow as much money as you can get your hands on. Then loot the project of as much as possible, and leave others holding the bag when the whole thing collapses. Rinse and repeat.
In his business career, this method resulted in an endless string of bankruptcies and lawsuits. In the case of this tax bill, all Americans will be left paying off this debt for generations, to the tune of two trillion dollars. In return, we'll get to see Social Security and Medicare, which we've all paid into all of our lives, gutted.
We elected an amoral crook to the most powerful position in the country. What did everyone expect?
5
As I see it, the only good thing about the Trump presidency is that it exposes the utter hypocricy of the Republican Party. One trillion dollars added to the deficit is just fine for these deficit hawks. A president with 16 accusations of sexual misconduct just fine with the rabid Bill Clinton impeachment brigade and the Evangelicals btw. All Trumps top adminstrators with their private e-mail accts just fine to those who who screamed 'but her e-mails' for two years. Oh and Trump posting anti-muslim film and endagering all those working in Muslim countries....'Benghasi, Benghasi, Benghasi.
Giving the Corporations a 20% tax rate at the expence of all our citizens
by reducing benefits of Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid is criminal
but what did we expect from this grifter. If this bill passes today start to watch for the Republicans to throw Trump under the bus. This is all they wanted him for..watch them run from the stench and all say...'it was't us, it was Trump.
9
I feel better knowing that Trump won't be able to enjoy his extra income from this fiasco from the friendly confines of Ft Leavenworth.
2
This tax bill is turning into a debacle and a joke. It's about time the Senate stop this charade to try and give Donald Trump a photo-op, and do some serious business of tax reform if that is what they intend on doing, by gathering together the top economists in this country, and do a real process of tax reform.
There is no excuse for the Senate to continue this farce, it's time to put a halt to this stupidity, and do the right thing.
I mean we have some of the best minds regarding the economy, we have Noble laureates in Economics; yet we have these partisan clowns looking to help force this travesty through to enable Donald Trump a photo-op that could force us into another recession and not to mention blow the deficit out of sight.
Stop the nonsense.
2
Unfortunately the House and the Senate wrote this bill and the President did not read it. The billionaire friends of the Republican Party drafted it and the Legislators worded it.
After Trump signs it he will give all the credit to his party and will be driving the bus.
At the rate that these acts are being revealed, perhaps we can balance the budget by taxing sex offenders.
Stop opening my wallet for the Koch siblings. Didn't your Mother teach you about Caring and Sharing and being Fair?
Take the big money interests out of my government, where are the grownups who protect us from bad people? Jeez!
2
Trump never paid for anything before. Why would he start now?
2
Jim Crow Mitchy and his GOP stalwarts all panicked over the debt in both 2011 and 2013 under their nemesis, Mr. Obama. Now, debt incurred under a white Republican means nothing to them as long as they can be self-serving to their own wealth. Oh, and serve their masters in corporate America and billionaires like Trump and the Koch boys who loathe the middle class and those who work for living.
3
Donald "Trump's red line" on this proposed Republican barbarian organized crime family income tax scam is hidden in his personal and family income tax returns and business records under the collaborating cooperating conspiratorial protection of Vladimir Putin.
1
I'm not normally a religious person, but now I pray to any deities that may exist to nip this evil tax bill in the bud and abolish it.
1
Why in the world woul dthey care what the most unpopular, actually hated leader, thinks about anything? It boggles my mind. Oh right, he is a friend to all the billionaire and soon to be trillionaire donors. Right, they all work for these people. The fcat that the American people, those lowly stupid people, might not like this doesn't matter. They are all planning to move anyway! They can take their untamed trillions anywhere.
2
This tax reform is nothing but a bunch of double talk -- I listen to and read interviews with the Senators, not once did they answer the questions asked by the reporters. You as reporters should just stop giving them air time print time if they are not going to answer the questions (How?) --
Trump stating he will pay more taxes - prove it as most of what he says is untrue. Again why waste time reporting on untrue statements. I understand the president you must report. But give it 5-10 Seconds Trump said this "xxx" and there is no proof this is correct, and move on why waste time on this .
Corp tax cuts will create more jobs -- prove it? or put provisions in the bill if it does not create jobs no cuts.
Have each Senator - tell us how this will affect 1) their taxes 2) how each lobbyist that they work with will affect their client's taxes
Then see what the American people think
PS - I would benefit from the tax cuts
thank you
1
If Congress doesn't know that they can call Trump's bluff, shame on them. He's a bully and a phony and is only looking out for his own personal interests. There is no "red line in the sand" with Trump. There is only his personal greed.
Regardless, this legislation is crap and should fail. I am contacting my senators (McCain and Flake) but they are failing me. McCain is off the rails and Flake seems to be positioning himself as a future lobbyist. Out of control, both of them. I hope Flake takes his personal animus towards Trump and votes NO based on that. But his big donors are probably pressuring him,, too.
Hold fast, Don-Don! Tank that bill!
The GOP is open for business alright...open to treason too.
Now that we have thermonuclear war, race hatred, Flynn and the Russians, Mitch McConnell and the GOP Congress want us to bend over just a little bit more giving us some Tax Reform for the wealthy...
America IS Great Again...
Off to the pharmacy...
1
"...making the United States more competitive with other developing nations" - I think the writer meant developed nations....
The only 'red line' of significance here
is the one across the necks of the working poor in America.
In this lynching of the common good,
services for those least-served will hang first.
3
First of all, Trump and his allies are bragging about how well the economy is doing now with the stock market in record territory...so why do we need tax reform??
Second, corporate CEO's admitted to Gary Cohn that they will further enrich shareholders with their tax cut boon rather than reinvest in the company or hire employees!
Third, if companies are doing so well that the stock market rises to such high levels, why aren't they using the capital to hire more people?? After all, even the 18000 as Barak Obama left office was an extraordinary valuation for the NYSE. It keeps going up so why is corporate America still crying for a tax cut? Something must be going well for them...
Finally, (for now,) there is such a good solution to improve the bottom line for shareholders and potential hires: CEO's and other top executives should cut their compensation in half and will still be extremely rich.
Those multiple millions saved could be put to really good use to create more room in the payroll for new hires or bring back better salaries and benefits for underlings and stop the independent contractor and part time employment nonsense.
The executives will hardly be forced onto welfare, will they?
Yes, it's redistribution of wealth but who can argue with that but since
the electorate keeps calling for job growth, obscene corporate executive compensation seems like the lowest hanging fruit.
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These so called public servants are selling us Americans off for their own job security because we will be the ones who will pay the deficit. This iis nothing more than an updated version of indentured slavery. We will become sharecroppers to our corporate masters.
Oh, come on. Do the Rs seriously think Trump will veto the bill if the cut is only to 25%? It's the Kochs and their ilk threatening to cut off campaign donations that is really worrying them
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Trump wants us to believe that he and other millionaires are going to be hurt by the tax cuts. Hmm, so his insistence on a 20% corporate tax is going to hurt him. Please, Mr. Trump, explain to me how this is going to hurt you. Should I start a Fund Me Page for you?
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The men in the ski mask ( especially the President ) are demanding their TRILLION+ loot ( your tax dollars ), otherwise they are going to tar down the country.
They really are doing that anyways, and are now demanding the cost of embalming fluid and a casket.
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the whole bill is like a father who likes to show off how rich he is and then spend whatever he has. When all the money is gone, he starts to panic and tried to sell everything he has and live day by day. Seriously, people go to school to study economics, and this bill is like a homeless person tax cut bill.
Who knows!? Those so-called conservative fiscal hawks who opposed virtually all the Obama spending proposals such as the 1-trillion transportation bill, are really closeted big spenders. And of course Trump's campaign promise to 'take care of his poor supporters' is just like his promise to 'be tough on big banks'; all empty promises and secret plans.
Hypocrite is as hypocrite does.
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An important reminder of the grand scheme of GOP governance:
"All we have to do is replace Obama. ... We are not auditioning for fearless leader. We don't need a president to tell us in what direction to go.
We know what direction to go. We want the Ryan budget. ... We just need a president to sign this stuff.
We don't need someone to think it up or design it. The leadership now for the modern conservative movement for the next 20 years will be coming out of the House and the Senate. [...]"
- Grover Norquist.
"Pick a Republican with enough working digits to handle a pen to become president of the United States.
This is a change for Republicans: the House and Senate doing the work with the president signing bills.
His job is to be captain of the team, to sign the legislation that has already been prepared."
- Grover Norquist.
Grover and his ilk have found their useful idiot who has those useful "working digits".
Trump may be catching on.
The only questions now are:
Will Trump, out of spite, take down the GOP and cause it to implode.
Or will the GOP throw Trump under the bus after he utilizes his useful "working digits".
Events will unfold. Relentlessly.
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Repeal and replace...
I wonder if those low-to-middle income Trump voters ever notice the huge "sucker" painted on their foreheads when they look in the mirror. This tax bill will surely hurt them, their kids, and grandkids the most. I, on the other hand, will get a sizable tax cut. Not one that I need, but one that I will use to support sane, progressive candidates and take my same-sex husband to dinner. Thank you conservatives.
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Trump is pushing this, the result will be the nation's bankruptcy. He and the "donors" though, will escape unscathed. Just like 2007.
I'm pretty sure that Trump will sign anything they put on his desk and the GOP knows it. There concern is simply lowering the taxes for the wealthy as much as possible.
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Quite a few republicans are going to lose their jobs if they vote for this corporate giveaway. They won’t get re-elected. The funny thing is— Trump doesn’t care if they do. He isn’t interested in the long term health of the Republican Party. He just wants his money.
There's no benefit whatsoever to the economy from reducing the corporate tax rate.
In all of the reporting so far, few if any have taken the time to explain that this isn't a tax on corporate operations, but its just a tax on the profits. A higher tax on corporate profits actually encourages them to reinvest profits in expansion, and reduced taxes on profits encourages them to pay dividends.
It might sound good in theory, but this tax cut is totally nonsensical.
How many ties do we have to "re-learn" that tax cuts don't pay for themselves .. don't generate a mountain of growth .. and serve only to concentrate wealth while running up the deficit.
Reagan’s economics guy, Martin Feldstein, found no evidence that the Reagan recovery had come from the Reagan administration’s personal income tax cuts.
In Feldstein's 1989 NBER paper “Budget Deficits, Tax Incentives and Inflation: A Surprising Lesson From the 1983-1984 Recovery” .. he and co-auther Elmendorf found that the recovery that began in 1983 had been caused mainly by an expansionary monetary policy. And, to a far lesser extent, it had come from tax incentives for business fixed investment.
If Conservatives spent more time actually studying the economic record, especially the record they seem to so fervently worship .. there would be alot less ignorance standing in the way of economic progress and prosperity for all.
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There are any number of reasons that the Senate can give for increasing the corporate tax rate from a proposed 20% to 25%. One is the Constitution, which gives the power of the purse to Congress. But we don't seem to be invoking the Constitution as a reason for doing things these days. A second is to say that the GOP has always been mindful of the deficit and that they could not in good conscience pass on a large deficit to future. That one might work. Or the Senate can finally realize that the 20% was the President's initial bid in the tax negotiations. Mr. Trump, as a veteran deal maker, knows that the initial bid is not necessarily the ending bid. I think the Senate should come back with a 30% Corporate tax rate, because in the end, we know they are going to split the difference to end up at 25%.
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Does anybody really think that Trump would veto a tax bill with a 22% corp rate that gives him and his family gigantic passthrough tax breaks, and repeals the AMT and estate tax? Come on.
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What is the current effective corporate tax rate? If they lower the rate from 35 to 20 percent and still keep all the loopholes that are now used to lower the effective rate, much less money will be raised.
Under this proposed great gift to corporations, what would be the resulting effective rate?
This is the core of the Republican Party: make the rich richer.
Everything else that Republicans espouse, all of their fear mongering and resentment-feeding, is a lure to get regular Americans to vote Republican against their own economic interests.
But 20% came out of nowhere.
FYI, the last time the US maximum corporate tax rate was 20% or less was 1939.
Somehow, we're supposed to believe we'll never have "prosperity" with a rate higher than 20%. I think the last 80 years or so of economic progress in the US argues otherwise.
1
Trump may draw praise from Republicans for his incessant prodding, but the fury that it has produced is no environment for rational consideration of the real economic effects of this bill. This is why there is such panic in the face of unfavorable analysis by various groups.
From the Koch side, they are merely interested in revenue for their businesses, not the federal government. They feel that if they see increased revenue, somehow the government will be okay, but government is not their concern. Trump is the same way, sticking with his 20% figure.
It's amazing how one inept person can sway congress. One inept person backed by the richest people in the nation.
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Most big businesses and high net worth individuals do not need to hold money or jobs in the US. They already have development, financial, and market options outside of the USA. Offshoring funds to minimize taxes and purchasing homes outside the US is routine for high net worth tax-payers (or, more precisely, tax-avoiders).
Perhaps this group, who collectively own the Republican Party, views the USA simply as a resource to strip-mine for assets, while they go somewhere else. This perspective is certainly more consistent with this bill and their other actions than any other explanation.
If trickle down worked then corporations would not be sitting sitting on record amounts of cash. It doesn't matter whether the corporate rate is 20, 25 or an even greater percent of earnings. There will be no windfall of any sort for the working public; and it is the workers who will bear the brunt of paying for this abomination of a bill if it passes.
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Donald Trump's 'red line' is a colorful clue.
He's a champion of red ink, an experienced bankruptcy filer who knows how to drive enterprises to insolvency.
Charging a Russian-Republican Orthodox Christmas gift to billionaires and himself to the nation's credit card when those same billionaires deserve a tax raise is economic, intellectual and moral bankruptcy.
This is not tax reform; it's Reverse Robin Hood Robber Baron oligarchic larceny.
RESIST !
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Any U.S. senator/house member who signs this bill is a TRAITOR.
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During the campaign Trump advocated tax reform that would bring back manufacturing jobs to America and to eliminate or reduce the carried interest aspect of our tax system that so benefits hedge fund managers.
His bowing to the Koch network on the border adjustment tax and the lobbying by hedge fund managers on carried interest is a betrayal of the promises he made to his supporters.
Maybe - maybe - in the next few days he will come to some sort of epiphany and realize that if he wants a corporate tax rate of 20% he has to fulfill his campaign promises.
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Carried interest directly benefits Trump and the Trump Organization. If ever there were a bold-faced lie about his tax reform intentions, it is that.
The current bill also now benefits golf course owners! Anyone surprised that slipped in? I thought not.
1
Trump, the white supremist, liar, cheat, and international eyesore demands total allegiance to his 20% corporate tax level. The Koch Brothers want their money. The fact that it would cost over a trillion dollars in increased debt which the US certainly doesn't want to pay back. Because this tax cut is funded by raising the federal debt. And by extension raising the money owed to service the debt. But Trump has a trick up his sleeve, just repudiate the debt.
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I'm glad you are a supporter. Tax reform in 2 weeks....a joke on working folks!!!
That's always been his policy. Go bankrupt, stiff investors and workers, and walk away with the money. Only, this is the United (no longer) states of America, not the Trump Casino in Atlantic City (for one). Ostriches with their heads in the sand are running it -- and waving their rear ends at the rest of us.
Repudiate the debt....what a novel idea......why hasn't that been imagined before now by all the "so-called deficit hawks" in the republican party. What could possibly go wrong with the US government declaring bankruptcy? ( please read with tongue firmly planted in cheek!)
I object to the entire Tac scheme. But just to address the idea that Trump's "red line" is a meaningful barrier --
how do these Republicans manage to ignore the bizarre behavior of this President and accord him any power whatsoever? Their push for an immediate tax cut for their donors class is desperate - but do they really think he would veto any bill they managed to set before him?
On what actions, what words, which of his nutty tweets, can they possibly be resting their respect for HIS opinion?
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