Most people think the IRS writes the tax book…
They do NOT….
Congress does…
(It’s actually in the Constitution)
Specifically the US House….
(House Ways and Means Committee)
With ‘tax the rich and big business’ part of initial Biden spending package pitch?
Lawmakers have to actually write what will be voted on….
In 2017 Trump and Republican rewrote parts of the tax code and called it a ‘reform’….
It actually was another chance for Republicans to shift the tax burden from the rich and big business to the middle class which reports say pays roughly 75% of….
(I will continue to feel that rich and big business do NOT really play taxes as a ‘generality’…)
The N Y Times has a piece out that examines the process of how the new tax code is being rushed to print and how like the 2017 law?
It will contain errors and unknown results ….
As they hunt for revenue to pay for their sprawling spending bill and try to unite a fractured caucus, Democrats are attempting to rewrite the United States tax code in a matter of days, proposing the kind of sweeping changes to how America taxes businesses and individuals that would normally take months or years to enact.
The effort has effectively discarded trillions of dollars of carefully crafted tax increases that President Biden proposed on the campaign trail and that top Democrats have rolled out in Congress. Instead, lawmakers are throwing a slew of new proposals into the mix, including a tax on billionaires, hoping that they can pass muster both legally and within their own party.
The frantic attempt to overhaul the complex U.S. tax code remained in a state of flux on Wednesday, with Senator Joe Manchin III and some House Democrats expressing reservations about a tax on billionaires that was proposed earlier in the day by Senator Ron Wyden of Oregon. On Tuesday, Mr. Manchin shot down a plan that would have given the Internal Revenue Service more visibility into certain taxpayers’ bank accounts in order to catch tax cheats, forcing a group of Senate Democrats who support the provision to try to negotiate a compromise.
Mr. Manchin’s opposition to a new federal paid leave program also appeared to doom its chances of being included in the final legislation, although supporters of the provision said they would fight to keep it intact.
Senator Mark Warner, a Virginia Democrat, acknowledged on Wednesday that the rapid pace of the legislative process posed risks and said it would be preferable to “allow some of this very, very complicated tax policy to get an appropriate airing back and forth.”
The need to roll out new tax proposals stems largely from the concerns of business groups — and moderate Democrats — who effectively killed Mr. Biden’s initial plan to raise the corporate tax rate to 28 percent from 21 percent to pay for his clean energy and social policy initiatives. Other ideas proposed by the White House, including raising the top marginal rate for the wealthiest taxpayers and doubling the capital gains tax, have also been jettisoned….
…
President Biden’s new plan to pay for his climate change and social policy package includes nearly $2 trillion in tax increases on corporations and the rich. But many of the more contentious and untested proposals that Democrats have been considering in recent weeks were left on the cutting-room floor.
The latest proposal reflects the reality that moderate Democrats are unwilling to back certain ideas aimed at raising money, including taxing the unrealized capital gains of billionaires and giving the Internal Revenue Service more insight into the finances of taxpayers. Ultimately, the package of tax increases mostly turns up the dial on more conventional tax policies, while adding some new wrinkles to curb maneuvers that allow tax avoidance.
“I think in terms of who they’re targeting, they did decide to target the larger population of very rich people and not just get the money from a very small group of superrich people,” said Howard Gleckman, a senior fellow at the Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center….
Note…
The final tax code bill will have to pass the muster of Senator Manchin and Sinema, Moderate Democrats and House Progressives….
Republicans are on the sidelines on this one….