May 20, 2016

Donald Trump Changes His Mind About Changing His Tax Plan

http://thinkprogress.org/economy/2016/05/13/3778121/trump-tax-no-changes/
"While the top marginal tax rate paid by the wealthy wouldn’t be quite as low as Trump’s original proposal, it would still have been lowered from its current rate, giving them a cut. Meanwhile, an analyst at the Tax Foundation, who crunched the new numbers to estimate its cost, revealed that “the benefits to the middle class basically go away” under the draft changes given that the top rates they pay would also be increased from Trump’s original plan and breaks under standard deductions would be wiped away. “You’re only giving [breaks] to the top,” he said of the draft. That would have made Trump’s tax plan even more tilted toward the rich. But his current one is already very generous. According to the Tax Policy Center, the richest fifth of the country would get more than two-thirds of the benefits, with the top 1 percent netting nearly 40 percent. The middle would get just 11 percent, while the poorest Americans would be handed 0.8 percent of the tax relief. Without any tweaks, the price tag will also stay eye-poppingly high. Both the Tax Policy Center and the Tax Foundation estimated that it would cost about $10 trillion over a decade, the most expensive plan offered up on the Republican side except for Ben Carson’s and far more than the cost of Ronald Reagan or George W. Bush’s tax cuts. Trump has not said how he would cover that cost. If he were to stick to his pledge to protect Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid from cuts — something he has been staunch about until a campaign spokesperson changed that position this week — that would require cutting all other government spending by more than three-quarters. On top of that, if he increased military spending or even kept it where it is, he would have to all but eliminate everything else the government does, including the programs that benefit the poor and middle class."