Donald Trump’s Tax Plan Would Make the Rich Richer, Uncle Sam Poorer by Jonathan Chew
According to a study.
An analysis of Donald Trump’s tax plan by a research institute reveals two interesting points: the U.S. government would get a lot poorer, and the wealthy would get a lot richer.
In the Tax Policy Center’s analysis of the Republican candidate’s proposal, the institute said that Trump’s plan would reduce federal revenues by $9.5 trillion over its first decade, and an additional $15.0 trillion over the next 10 years. Including interest costs, the Center said, the proposal would add $11.2 trillion to the national debt by 2026.
To put that into perspective, Trump’s tax plan would cause the debt to GDP ratio to hit 180% by 2036, the Center found.
Most of the revenue loss from Trump’s plan – which you can read here – stems from individual income tax cuts, the Center said in its study released Tuesday. While the plan cuts taxes for all income levels, the biggest cuts involve the highest-income level, both in dollar terms and as a percentage of income. By 2017, the highest-income 1% of taxpayers would receive a tax cut of 17.5% of after-tax income, and the top 0.1% — those with incomes of over $3.7 million in current dollars — would experience an average tax cut of more than $1.3 million, nearly 19% of after-tax income.
In contrast, the lowest-income households would receive an average tax cut of $128, or 1% of after-tax income, in Trump’s plan. Overall, on average, the proposal would would cut income taxes by around $5,100 per person, or about 7% of after-tax income.
Trump’s tax plan, released in September, also aims to simplify the tax code into four brackets from the current seven, and would also seek to lower the corporate tax rate. One of the stated goals of his tax proposal is that it “doesn’t add to our debt and deficit, which are already too large.”
Fortune has contacted Trump’s campaign for comment and will update this story if they respond.
Comments are closed.
