Trump tax cuts have not paid for themselves

[K1052]

What a surprise.

Modest growth and gigantic deficits like everybody but the GOP caucus predicted. When Republicans tell you something it's relatively safe to presume the opposite is more likely.

Data released this week by the budget office provides the first complete picture of federal revenues for the 2018 calendar year, when the tax cuts were in full effect. (The government’s 2018 fiscal year included three months from the end of 2017, when most of the tax cuts were not in effect.) In the inaugural year of the tax cuts — with economic growth accelerating and the jobless rate falling to an 18-year low — federal revenues from corporate, payroll and personal income taxes actually fell.That’s true whether you adjust revenues and growth for inflation — or not.

The 2018 results are, oddly enough, what a lot of economists predicted would happen with Mr. Trump’s cuts, including ones who generally favor tax cuts. Total federal revenues in 2018 came in roughly where the Tax Foundation, a Washington think tank that typically projects large growth boosts from tax cuts, had forecast — which is to say, well below the budget office’s baseline.

Just because the new law helped to increase economic growth, said Kyle Pomerleau, an economist with the Tax Foundation, “it doesn’t mean that it is going to pay for itself.” Mr. Pomerleau said additional growth from the law “will continue to be modest over the next couple of years.”

In December 2017, as Republicans sped the tax cuts through Congress, the Tax Foundation released a projection that the cuts would add about $450 billion to federal deficits over 10 years, after accounting for the additional economic growth it would spur. The group has since redone the analysis, with what Mr. Pomerleau called improvements to its methodology. It now predicts deficits will increase by $900 billion — double its original forecast.

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/11/business/trump-tax-cuts-revenue.html

 

[UglyCasanova]

Never should have cut them. Spending is the real problem, until that goes down cutting taxes solves nothing other than shifting the burden to our kids.

 

[Jaskalas]

If the Republicans have lied about trickle down growth, what else have they got wrong?
Perhaps Republicans are not the economists that people simply assume they are.

 

[hal2kilo]

I'm absolutely shocked.

 

[K1052]

If the Republicans have lied about trickle down growth, what else have they got wrong?
Perhaps Republicans are not the economists that people simply assume they are.

I don't know, maybe we should let them zero out the social programs so we have a legit revolution.

 

[Brainonska511]

Never should have cut them. Spending is the real problem, until that goes down cutting taxes solves nothing other than shifting the burden to our kids.

I see people say this all the time. How about outlining some specifics of what you'd like to see cut?

 

[Indus]

Maybe we really do need the 70% tax rate to balance our books for the last 38 years of GOP theft from the middle class and the working poor.

 

[Meghan54]

Maybe we really do need the 70% tax rate to balance our books for the last 38 years of GOP theft from the middle class and the working poor.

When you mention a 70% tax rate, or whatever the figure is, be sure to include "top marginal" in that statement. Too many fools actually don't understand our progressive tax structure and instead believe rich have all their income taxed at a rate higher than others.

 

[UglyCasanova]

I see people say this all the time. How about outlining some specifics of what you'd like to see cut?

Everything, start with the military. Means test* social security recipients. Get rid of VA. Lots of ways


*edited, autocorrect got me again

 

[Indus]

When you mention a 70% tax rate, or whatever the figure is, be sure to include "top marginal" in that statement. Too many fools actually don't understand our progressive tax structure and instead believe rich have all their income taxed at a rate higher than others.

Wahh people don't understand that under Obama we paid less taxes if we made less than $75k as a couple???

2016 Federal Income Tax Brackets (Obamaland)

• Tax rate Single Married, filing jointly
• 10% $0 to $9,275 $0 to $18,550
• 15% $9,276 to $37,650 $18,550 to $75,300

2019 Federal Income Tax Brackets (Trumpistan)

• Tax Rate Single Married Filing Jointly
• 12% $9,525 - $38,700 $19,050 - $77,400
• 22% $38,700 - $82,500 $77,400 - $165,000

 

[BonzaiDuck]

When you mention a 70% tax rate, or whatever the figure is, be sure to include "top marginal" in that statement. Too many fools actually don't understand our progressive tax structure and instead believe rich have all their income taxed at a rate higher than others.

Marginalism is the concept not understood by many, or not understood enough. It's a concept basic to first semester Calculus. The ignorance favors avaricious grifters at the top like Trump. I hear all sorts of pie-in-the-sky drivel coming from blue-collar Trumpies. "Give everybody a flat tax!" they say, as though they -- with their less-than-$58,000/year incomes -- will benefit from less public goods, less public spending and miniscule differences in average taxes from their already paltry pockets.

Someone else -- Jaskalas -- insinuated that there's a mythical idea that Republicans are good economists. Of course, the Trumpists reject all knowledge of the modern era and specifically reject all specialized expertise in economics, government, foreign policy and military science.

Count the number of Nobel Laureates supporting the GOP since 2000, and the number of Nobels on the progressive side of the coin. You will find a stark imbalance.

But Trumpies don't bother with empirical fact or simple descriptive statistics either, unless a distortion of limited fact and failed method support their preconceived beliefs.

 

[shortylickens]

Never should have cut them. Spending is the real problem, until that goes down cutting taxes solves nothing other than shifting the burden to our kids.

My understanding is every 2 trillion of debt is one generation of Americans.
So actually its not gonna be clear for even our great great great great great great grandchildren.

 

[Engineer]

Wahh people don't understand that under Obama we paid less taxes if we made less than $75k as a couple???

2016 Federal Income Tax Brackets (Obamaland)

• Tax rate Single Married, filing jointly
• 10% $0 to $9,275 $0 to $18,550
• 15% $9,276 to $37,650 $18,550 to $75,300

2019 Federal Income Tax Brackets (Trumpistan)

• Tax Rate Single Married Filing Jointly
• 12% $9,525 - $38,700 $19,050 - $77,400
• 22% $38,700 - $82,500 $77,400 - $165,000

From a tax rate and bracket point of view, people will be paying lower rates now than under Obama (your charts seem to be missing some brackets). The brackets that you post show that you'll be paying less (before the loss of exemptions, etc. are factored in). Where they get you is the elimination of personal exemptions and the new standard deduction. Depending on your situation, many will end up paying more than under previous laws and most probably won't realize it. I've read that 70% of the people who itemized in the past will no longer be able to under the new tax plan and when factoring in the loss of personal exemptions, those people will be lucky to break even. That's why the rush to throw in the expanded child (under 17) tax credits because without them, it would have been a shit show for people in the middle / lower middle classes with a couple or more children.

Because my kids are older than 16, I'll be lucky to break even on this mess.


As far as the OP goes, all I've got to say is DUH! Everyone with an ounce of truth in their soul knew this would happen but it was masterfully sold to the base as a big win. The only winners are those at the top (same with Kentucky's new 5% flat tax rate - fucked the bottom 95% with tax hikes while lowering the top 5%).

 

[PJFrylar]

*Calculates in Republican*

I'm not seeing what you guys are seeing, these are great numbers. Many people are saying that they are quite possibly the greatest numbers in American history.

 

[dank69]

But guys revenue was the highest it's ever been.

 

[Jhhnn]

As far as the OP goes, all I've got to say is DUH! Everyone with an ounce of truth in their soul knew this would happen but it was masterfully sold to the base as a big win. The only winners are those at the top (same with Kentucky's new 5% flat tax rate - fucked the bottom 95% with tax hikes while lowering the top 5%).

Conservative adulation of Wealth is part & parcel of their well propagandized headsets. When they fix their gaze on the high priests of greed atop the economic pyramid of inequality they somehow imagine that the next blood sacrifice won't be their own but rather somebody else. They imagine that a show of deference & respect will will somehow spare them from the depredations of the utter selfishness & greed of the impersonal financial elite.

 

[Sonikku]

Wahh people don't understand that under Obama we paid less taxes if we made less than $75k as a couple???

2016 Federal Income Tax Brackets (Obamaland)

• Tax rate Single Married, filing jointly
• 10% $0 to $9,275 $0 to $18,550
• 15% $9,276 to $37,650 $18,550 to $75,300

2019 Federal Income Tax Brackets (Trumpistan)

• Tax Rate Single Married Filing Jointly
• 12% $9,525 - $38,700 $19,050 - $77,400
• 22% $38,700 - $82,500 $77,400 - $165,000

Yeah, but think about the hardships forced upon other families.

Can't you see how sad they are? Poor bastards barely scrapped by under Obama.

 

[Vic]

Everything, start with the military. Means gets social security recipients. Get rid of VA. Lots of ways

Lol

 

[Jhhnn]

Everything, start with the military. Means test* social security recipients. Get rid of VA. Lots of ways


*edited, autocorrect got me again

And Build the Wall!

 

[UglyCasanova]

What’s lol? It was asked how I’d start cutting and I listed some starting points.

 

[JSt0rm]

Never should have cut them. Spending is the real problem, until that goes down cutting taxes solves nothing other than shifting the burden to our kids.

You voted to watch it burn.

 

[Jhhnn]

Yeah, but think about the hardships forced upon other families.

Can't you see how sad they are? Poor bastards barely scrapped by under Obama.

It's not even about anybody in the 99%. It's about the people in the rarified realm of the upper 1%, the source of GOP funding for all their efforts.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news...or-real/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.f06330e718ff

Enjoy your pissant tax cuts, chumps. The tax cut for a guy at the top is more money than you'll make in a lifetime. They can put that money in govt bonds & make more in a week than you'll make in a year, too. Forever.

MAGA on, fools.

 

[HomerJS]

Has Trump or his people said, "I never really claimed tax cuts would pay for themselves"

 

[Vic]

What’s lol? It was asked how I’d start cutting and I listed some starting points.

Lol means good luck. Republican voters are just as much beneficiaries of those programs as Democratic voters.

 

[Vic]

Republicans believe in cutting the deficit much the same way a televangelist believes in fidelity. It's a good public image to have but privately it limits your options.