If:
The GOP could achieve ultimate power:
They’re the party of the proletariat now!!
GOP strains to find $1 trillion to fund a tax cut for billionaires. Meanwhile, the Pentagon is struggling to find* $6.5 trillion it can’t account for.
*Just kidding. The Pentagon really doesn’t give a shit. After all, it just got another $15 billion from a defense funding supplemental in the omnibus funding package. Good times.
They cannot actually be this fucking stupid. It is not possible that any politician could really so blinded by dogma and fealty to the oligarch class that they will line up to sprint into spinning propellers, dive head first into wood-chippers and try to mate with chainsaws this way.
Yes you idiots, tell us again how you need to raise taxes on homeowners and people who actually work for a goddamn living to give a tax cut to corporations and fatten up the dividends and stock valuations of rich people. Surely that will be the key to a resounding victory in 2018. Oh no, say I and all other Democrats, please oh please don’t do that. Whatever you do, don’t completely upend the most important economic assumption underlying the decision of every single person earning less than a million dollars a year with a mortgage about how big a mortgage payment they could afford to give tax cuts to rich people. No, not that. Anything but that.
Jesus Christ, Social Security privatization, FDR’s court packing plan, prohibition, and the Tea Act of 1773 were triumphs of political genius by comparison.
I’ll give up my itemized deductions if Trump and other very wealthy lawmakers of both parties will give up theirs.
As long as existing house sales and new housing starts are economic indicators, and economic news drives politics, the mortgage interest deduction is not going anywhere.
I would tend to agree with you, but these are strange times we live in. Anything for the rich benefactors.
Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis., made a pitch for reform, saying on Monday, “Just like the rotary phone of the 80s, the American tax code is seriously outdated.”
And you thinking the fucking GOP isn’t, Eddie? It should rename itself the Buggywhip Party.
Yeah, but those rich benefactors benefit in two ways from this deduction - first, obviously, they get to collect on it and, second, any properties they sell are being bought by people who also benefit from it.
It’s easy to pick the low-hanging fruit in such a dilemma, but it’s pretty clear that, without this mortgage deduction, the housing industry is on permanent screeching halt.
You might not be too far off there, Hornblower. If you are going to seriously consider reducing or eliminating the mortgage interest deduction, then, in all fairness, you have to consider reducing or eliminating the debt interest deduction for corporations (if corporations are people too, my friend…)
If you have a mortgage, you almost certainly are itemizing and taking the mortgage interest deduction. Now, I’ve seen floated, and wouldn’t necessarily disagree with the approach of raising the standard personal deduction to exceed the level of the “average” mortgage’s interest costs in the country. That would even out the deductions for those who don’t (but maybe want to) own their home, while still leaving a small window for those with larger mortgages to deduct a little more (but capping it at no more than $1million, and perhaps less). I would have to have someone I trust run the numbers on that, in terms of the total government revenue, but it seems on the surface to be reasonable…
As far as the corporate tax cut goes, as soon as the Republicans can show me ONE public company that actually pays 25% in taxes, I’ll consider a tax cut for them.
“The administration wants the state and local deduction to be eliminated or reduced because, officials say, the federal government shouldn’t be subsidizing states and wealthy households.”
https://wallethub.com/edu/states-most-least-dependent-on-the-federal-government/2700/
What they really mean is “we want to further fuck the blue states.”
Yeah, but you’re talking about the GOP here. The only fairness they care about is to themselves and no one else.
Trump has said publicly that he hoped to lower the top tax rate for corporations from 35 percent to 15 percent — a level that Ryan has ruled out as impractically low.
Looks like he may have to reach into his fat ass and pull out another number.
Frankly, as I said elsewhere today, I bet they can do it and get away with it completely because half the country will notice that giant oligarch dick going deeper up their asses and then blame minorities and illegals for it.
I take your point and I mostly agree with it. Except maybe your last clause. Here’s the view from my life: I grew up in Appalachia and for several years I have been buying derelict houses and fixing them (jobs for Appalachians!) and then either renting them out or selling them. Only one of my buyers was able to get a bank loan and that was through the VA program. Every other time, it has been on a land contract which is beneficial for the buyers and detrimental to me. These buyers can qualify for the mortgage interest deduction but then I have to pay taxes on the interest, which, given our relative income levels is a net benefit to the government. Generally I pay more in taxes on the interest payments (and I don’t charge more than 3%!) than they receive as a deduction on the buyers’ side. I just don’t think that the mortgage interest deduction benefits lower-income buyers very much at all. Usually, they would get much more help from down payment assistance. If you can educate me, I would greatly appreciate it!
Pssst, GOP, start at DoD. I’ll bet you can find a half-tril over 10 years there.
Unfortunately, the evidence to date suggests that they really can. Just look at the ACA; they’re condemning hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of their own constituents to bankruptcy and death. Has it stopped them?
Additionally, quoting from the article:
Some lawmakers are pointing toward economic growth and job expansion, to be achieved with lower tax rates and a doubled standard deduction…
Why, oh why, is it so damned difficult for news organizations to point out that this will not work?! Look: if we were in a scenario where businesses were starved for capital, then acting on the supply side of the fence is absolutely the right thing to do. We aren’t in that scenario; we haven’t been in that scenario for decades; and putting more money into the supply side of the equation won’t do a damn thing for the economy (other than lead to more bubbles because the wealthy cannot possibly spend everything they’re getting).
You want to stimulate growth? Work on the demand side. Put money into the hands of those who will immediately turn around and spend it on that new television, that new car, on a night out on the town, and so on. Raise the minimum wage, provide free or significantly reduced-cost child care, provide free or significantly reduced-cost medical care, etc., etc. There are dozens, if not hundreds, of proposals, all of which will have a better impact on the economy than this same tax-cuts-for-the-wealthy horseshit that Republicans simply cannot drop.
Has it really escaped everyone’s notice that the Republican solution to everything is tax cuts? The economy is doing poorly? Tax cuts to stimulate the economy! The economy is doing great? Tax cuts to give money back! The economy is in the middle? Tax cuts because reasons…
Clinton raised taxes and oversaw one of the best economic records of the past 50 years. Bush dramatically lowered taxes and had one of the worse economic records of the past century. Why do we never learn?!
True of IRAs too:
The federal government incentivizes retirement by allowing you to reduce your taxable income by saving money in 401(k) plans or IRAs. But employer-sponsored retirement plans only benefit those people with employers that offer them (so, largely not people who work in retail or the fast-food sector). And the benefit for IRAs doesn’t help people who have no money left over for retirement after they pay their living expenses. In total, about 66 percent of these retirement subsidies go to the top 20 percent of taxpayers. Less than 1 percent go to the bottom 20 percent.
It might be a tough sell.
Could take two, maybe even three tweets to bring the Trumpplings around to full support for lifetime servitude.
I fear we could go on and on with this topic. How about a tax credit for child care when you earn about $15,000 per year and your granny gives you child care in exchange for rides to the doctor and the grocery store? It is very expensive to be poor.