Posted on 04/27/2017 7:54:01 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
It is hard to think of a more obvious recent public-policy failure than the tax cuts that Kansas Gov. Sam Brownback championed in 2012. The state has been mired in a perpetual budget crisis ever since the package passed, forcing its residents to swallow painful spending cuts in essential areas like education. Kansas' credit rating has been downgraded, as well. The financial wreckage has been so severe that Brownback's fellow Republicans are now staging a rebellion; in February, the GOP–run legislature voted to undo the cuts, and came close to overruling the governor's veto.
Somehow, the sharpest minds in the Trump administration have gazed upon the smoldering ashes of this misbegotten experiment and decided that they should imitate it. On Wednesday, Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin and National Economic Council Director Gary Cohn unveiled the skimpy outline of the White House's current tax plan. While the one-page document lacked much in the way of detail, it confirmed that the president wanted to cut the tax rate on so-called “pass-through” businesses to 15 percent—which would amount to a bigger, potentially more disastrous version of Brownback's ill-fated cuts.
“This would be Kansas on steroids,” Eric Toder, co-director of the Tax Policy Center, told me.
Pass-through entities are by far the most common type of business in the U.S., encompassing about 94 percent of firms as of 2011. Instead of paying corporate taxes, they simply distribute profits among their owners, who then have those profits taxed as normal income. Obviously, many small businesses are organized this way, but so are major law firms, hedge funds, real estate developers, and plenty of other extremely profitable enterprises. The Trump Organization? It's a pass-through.
This raises the obvious concern that the White House is simply planning a massive, backdoor tax cut for the rich.
(Excerpt) Read more at slate.com ...
The slogans from the left are getting tiresome.
50+ years of the same inanity.
Eliminate progressivism at the federal level and roll back FDR’s legacy of high handed lawlessness and we’d do very well with less and governance by constitutional means.
All right. The lefties getting back to their typical class warfare rants. I was getting worried that they were too obsessed with the “Blame Russia” card! LOL
I can remember when I could deduct all the interest from my credit cards....and it was a bundle.
We Californians will get killed, paying taxes on our state income and property taxes. Even worse if the leftist CA dictatorship gets rid of Prop 13. Don’t tell me to move. I’m too old and ingrained with my medical network.
Let people keep their own money?
HORRORS!!!!
Slate?
Spending money it doesn’t have has turned the USA into a debt ridden monstrosity living on borrowed time.
Also, if Kansas didn't have all these Illegal kids in our school system we would have this budget problem now then would we?
RE: if Kansas didn’t have all these Illegal kids in our school system we would have this budget problem now then would we?
I’m not familiar with Kansas, and I thought the illegal kids problems were only affecting the border states.
How large is the illegal population in Kansas anyway?
Simple answer....It’s not your money.
THe problem was not the tax rate reductions, it was the refusal to cut spending, and the imposition of federal mandates that required these expenditures.
And.....right on cue.....the “massive back-door tax cut for the EEEEEEEVIL Rich!”
RE: That state tax deduction is offset by the doubled standard deduction.
That’s only good for the low and reasonably taxed states ( Florida, Texas, New Hampshire, Washington, etc., states that do not have incomes taxes come out as winners ).
The losers are going to be the high tax states ( especially those with HIGH PROPERTY TAXES ). NY, NJ and CT come to mind.
Most self-respecting thieves won’t try to tell their victims that robbing them is actually quite good for them; it’s humiliating to be laughed at while you’re getting your a$$ kicked. Doesn’t seem to bother democraps though.
My accountant says the double standard deduction would just about wipe out my tax bill which would be very good for me of course. But lots of things get proposed and never happen so don’t celebrate yet.
KS' other tax problem is, that the Sebelius' socialist Supreme Court, believes it is the only entity to decide what the taxpayers actually owe in our taxes and they are the sole authority to determine what amount of money our school districts need to operate our public skuuls!
RE: But lots of things get proposed and never happen so don’t celebrate yet.
Living in Long Island, I won’t celebrate this. we have the highest property taxes and state taxes in the USA. Those will NOT be tax deductible at the Federal level with Trump’s proposal.
Satire?
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