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Trump's Treasury pick targets taxes, trade reforms

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bomb

Unconfirmed Member
Corporate tax rate should be 50 to 70% and its going to 15%. Public services are so screwed in this country for decades to come.

I'm guessing that you do not run a corporation. There would be no incentive to start or even run an existing corporation at that high of a rate. Why not just make it 100% at that rate?

There are roughly 30 million businesses in America and you probably are thinking of 3 or 4 monster sized corporations who skirt paying taxes in the first place. Make it 100%, they still wouldn't be paying.
 
Corporate tax rate should be 50 to 70% and its going to 15%. Public services are so screwed in this country for decades to come.

I hope to god you are way too young and naive to understand how dumb this statement is.

Why would anyone bother starting a business when corp taxes are 50-70%. I guess you want a socialist utopia where businesses exist solely to fund the government?

Under the current structure, many large businesses are able to reduce their tax rate through a number of different means. They are still getting charged the full rate, they just reduce TI and keep foreign profits overseas. Raising the rate will not bring in taxes, in fact it will push even the smallest businesses to take dramatic steps to hide income.
 
One thing is for damn sure - inflation is going to come roaring back soon. So a good time to invest in stocks and bonds and a bad time to be holding onto cash.

If you're holding a lot of debt via student loans and/or a mortgage like a lot of young people (myself included) more inflation will be a good thing. So there will be positives, I just hope the deductions they get rid of and the possible tariffs they enact don't overide the good this will do.
 

mid83

Member
Corporate tax rate should be 50 to 70% and its going to 15%. Public services are so screwed in this country for decades to come.

I know people on this forum have an aversion to tax cuts, but that is just pure insanity. You think a massive corporate tax increase like this wouldn't have a horrific effect on the economy? This stuff doesn't happen in a vacuum.
 

greycolumbus

The success of others absolutely infuriates me.
Of all the dumb stuff Trump will do, this is some of the least dumb.

Economists agree!

http://www.npr.org/sections/money/2016/10/26/499490275/episode-387-the-no-brainer-economic-platform

Number crunchers from both sides of the political spectrum came up with a list of no-brainer economic reforms. Even the crunchiest granola smelling hippy economists thinks the corporate income tax needs to go away.

The trade stuff is not going to work but hey.

edit: At 13:00 if you are going to listen.

edit: I was late with this!

Ah, that's right. I think I remember this. I agree with the logic but obviously it's not as simple as a corporate tax cut. The ecotax will never happen on the scale they suggest with the new administration. Federal drug reform probably wont happen. No sane candidate would talk about these policies in fair terms.
 
I hope to god you are way too young and naive to understand how dumb this statement is.

Why would anyone bother starting a business when corp taxes are 50-70%. I guess you want a socialist utopia where businesses exist solely to fund the government?

Under the current structure, many large businesses are able to reduce their tax rate through a number of different means. They are still getting charged the full rate, they just reduce TI and keep foreign profits overseas. Raising the rate will not bring in taxes, in fact it will push even the smallest businesses to take dramatic steps to hide income.

Not just that, it would only accelerate tax focused M&A where the company purchases a foreign entity to relocate its HQ and pay taxes oversees. Ireland being one of the most popular destinations.
 

Xe4

Banned
Yeah, I'm actually ok with redusing or eliminating coporate income tax, so long as the income was made up for by increasing personal income tax, but that's not going to happen. If anything personal income tax is going to lower as well.
 

Tecl0n

Member
Technically speaking, lowering taxes on corporations is "good" in the sense that taxes on corporations are automatically transferred to prices, but then again the US doesn't have an inflation problem right now so that advantage is somewhat lost, and as long as it is countered by personal income taxes that targets higher earning percentiles. Otherwise fiscal problems AHOY or the gutting of the public sector begins.
 

Juice

Member
A lot of poor Trump supporters barely paid federal income taxes as it is. I am sure small business owners who support Trump think he is a Godsend, though.


Except small business owners don't pay corporate taxes at all, unless they've got really stupid accountants. Almost every business that didn't take on a bunch of outside investors is organized as a pass-through entity (like an LLC or an S-corp), which means all the income passes to the ownership and taxed as personal income.

Corporate taxes apply to (typically much larger) C-corps, and are typically paid before investors can see dividends hit their accounts as profit, which is then taxed as a capital gains.

Guess which taxes the Republicans are going to slash: corporate and cap gains taxes. That's going to be great for the top 0.1% and will be barely substantial to the top 1% and probably completely unrealized by the other 99%.
 

Window

Member
Part of lowering the corporate tax rate and adjusting how foreign profits are taxed for US corporations, is to dramatically reduce the incentive for US corporations to just park cash overseas where it is essentially untaxed. By lowering the rate to 15% and giving a one-time tax holiday rate of 10%, US companies should be willing to repatriate the cash. For example, Apple has $230B in cash held overseas and they don't want to repatriate it because they get hit with the full tax rate (40%).

Trump is actually proposing a deemed repatriation which means that these companies will be taxed at the new rate on foreign profits declared whether or not they actually repatriate the cash. Thus, just keeping the cash offshore doesn't protect you from the tax.

He believes that by forcing the companies to pay taxes on foreign profits, this will be a quick influx of cash that is just held outside our current tax rules.

Regarding the cost of a worker in China or Mexico, he is proposing tariffs that will raise the cost of these goods to a point that US manufacturing can actually be competitive.
Ireland has a corporate tax rate of 12.5%. There are other tax havens with even lower rates. What incentive would large companies have to move their profits back to the US and what prevents Ireland from engaging in a form of tax rate competition?

On the subject of corporate tax, cash repatriation and foreign profits Obama had a similar strategy (albeit with higher rates than what Trump has proposed). I don't know if the plan ever went through or had success. Is Trump likely to be more effective?

I don't believe Trump will engage in a trade war with any large economy of note. Though the threat alone can be of some bargaining value (but for how long?).

Technically speaking, lowering taxes on corporations is "good" in the sense that taxes on corporations are automatically transferred to prices, but then again the US doesn't have an inflation problem right now so that advantage is somewhat lost, and as long as it is countered by personal income taxes that targets higher earning percentiles. Otherwise fiscal problems AHOY or the gutting of the public sector begins.

This reminds me, supply side policies would be deflationary and in an environment where both inflation and interest rates are already very low, is pursuing such policies really a good idea (at least in the medium term)?
 

Steejee

Member
Getting rid of the corporate income tax is something economists across the political spectrum actually agree on. They also agree on other unpopular measures like eliminating the mortgage tax deduction.

After listening to the whole segment I've become okay with it if we went to a luxury (consumption) and deterrent tax policy. That's not going to happen under Trump though: more likely you'll see major cuts in non-military programs.

Shit I'd be down for those all (I'm guessing you'd probably want to do all 6 at once to keep things balanced), but I have a hard time seeing the full set ever getting past Congress.
 
Is the general idea that cutting taxes on businesses will result in an increase in employee salaries?

Because why in the world would that happen?
 

Tecl0n

Member
This reminds me, supply side policies would be deflationary and in an environment where both inflation and interest rates are already very low, is pursuing such policies really a good idea (at least in the medium term)?

I would avise against it. Doing such things in an economy with such little inflation like the US, would be going the way of deflation. And mending a deflation state is hard as fuck. Almost no monetary model in economics has a mend for such a situation. Look at certain EU countries, real interest rates are fucking negative and an inflation rebound is nowhere in sight. This is offseted, if Trump's infrastructure plan is real which would generate an inflation surge if it is payed by emission and not tax breaks.
 

Usobuko

Banned
That's going to be great for the top 0.1% and will be barely substantial to the top 1% and probably completely unrealized by the other 99%.

So like globalization.

Stakeholders and executive managements get lion share of the pie and the rest should be grateful to even get bread crumbs.

Whoever thinks this isn't going to be a lopsided gain to people at the top and will actually trickle down for shit, convince me why so.
 
I think they are also planning massive tax cuts on the rich and others, but also for a quite a few in the middle class they have their taxes raised.

I would avise against it. Doing such things in an economy with such little inflation like the US, would be going the way of deflation. And mending a deflation state is hard as fuck. Almost no monetary model in economics has a mend for such a situation. Look at certain EU countries, real interest rates are fucking negative and an inflation rebound is nowhere in sight. This is offseted, if Trump's infrastructure plan is real which would generate an inflation surge if it is payed by emission and not tax breaks.

Well the infrastructure plan will have to be tax breaks because Trump's tax plans cut federal revenue ,thus it'll increase debt. If the infrastructure plan has a lot of federal spending it'll help increase the debt. In my mind you can't cut federal revenue and then increase federal spending without massive cuts on other area of federal spending without any consequences.
 
Stakeholders and executive managements get lion share of the pie and the rest should be grateful to even get bread crumbs.

Whoever thinks this isn't going to be a lopsided gain to people at the top and will actually trickle down for shit, convince me why so.

I don't think anyone thinks that.

Except for people who didn't look into the tax plans of Trump.

I find it funny people who argued that Trump was a good candidate because he would get rid of the establishment are tripping over themselves seeing these policies and picks.
 
Mnuchin and Ross said lower tax rates would be offset by reductions in the number of income tax deductions.

This is what I don't understand from Trump fans. Many of them will see their taxes go up because of Trump's plan. Based on the # of dependents you have and your marital status, you might be stuck with thousands in taxes now.

Yet they voted for him anyway.

Reap what you sew. I look forward to the bitching and moaning from them when they do their 2017 returns.
 

Bebpo

Banned
Except small business owners don't pay corporate taxes at all, unless they've got really stupid accountants. Almost every business that didn't take on a bunch of outside investors is organized as a pass-through entity (like an LLC or an S-corp), which means all the income passes to the ownership and taxed as personal income.

Corporate taxes apply to (typically much larger) C-corps, and are typically paid before investors can see dividends hit their accounts as profit, which is then taxed as a capital gains.

Guess which taxes the Republicans are going to slash: corporate and cap gains taxes. That's going to be great for the top 0.1% and will be barely substantial to the top 1% and probably completely unrealized by the other 99%.

Yup, as a small business owner, we're gonna get hosed by this. There's not even a single silver lining from a horrific Trump presidency unless you are in the 1%
 

Sulik2

Member
I hope to god you are way too young and naive to understand how dumb this statement is.

Why would anyone bother starting a business when corp taxes are 50-70%. I guess you want a socialist utopia where businesses exist solely to fund the government?

Under the current structure, many large businesses are able to reduce their tax rate through a number of different means. They are still getting charged the full rate, they just reduce TI and keep foreign profits overseas. Raising the rate will not bring in taxes, in fact it will push even the smallest businesses to take dramatic steps to hide income.

The US Corporate tax rate was over 50% in the late 1940s and 50s. You know the period that allowed the USA to build its infrastructure and grow a strong thriving middle class that powered the worlds largest economy. I fully believe we need a return to those sorts of tax rates with a heavy dose of socialist systems, single payer healthcare, free college, etc..., built on those taxes if the USA is going to have any chance to maintain itself as a sustainable economy in the long term and not collapse into a modern version of feudalism with a tiny rich population and a massive poor underclass.
 
I hope to god you are way too young and naive to understand how dumb this statement is.

Why would anyone bother starting a business when corp taxes are 50-70%. I guess you want a socialist utopia where businesses exist solely to fund the government?

Under the current structure, many large businesses are able to reduce their tax rate through a number of different means. They are still getting charged the full rate, they just reduce TI and keep foreign profits overseas. Raising the rate will not bring in taxes, in fact it will push even the smallest businesses to take dramatic steps to hide income.

I suppose it would be a progressive corporate tax, because yeah, a flat corporate tax that high is stupid
 

emag

Member
Corporate tax rates should be lowered, but capital gains should be taxed like other personal income (instead of at 15-20%).

Economists have said that eliminating corporate tax would encourage businesses to reinvest the extra money back into itself, but I dont actually think that would happen. CEOs make millions- thousand times more than their workers. All that extra money would go right into their pockets.

And then it'll be taxed at 39.6%, which is greater than the current corporate tax rate.
 

Chumly

Member
Ultimately the United States does need to reduce its corporate tax rate. I certainly don't trust trump nor republicans to do it in an effective nor fair manor.
 
You know what? Go ahead. Simplify the tax code. Make it into the length of a menu at Chilis or whatever the fuck they've been harping on. Let's see if it is the magical end all solution to every problem like they have been saying it will be forever
 
3-4% Growth? lol With what industry? Coal mining?


It's not like there is a budding green energy sector than the the US could lead in innovation with the potential to grow the economy significantly....
 
3-4% Growth? lol With what industry? Coal mining?


It's not like there is a budding green energy sector than the the US could lead in innovation with the potential to grow the economy significantly....

Republican news is overshadowing any and all green related news, so it's budding to everyone except the Republican voter who elected Trump.
 

GhaleonEB

Member
"We think by cutting corporate taxes we’ll create huge economic growth and we’ll have huge personal income," Mnuchin said in the interview.
One might say, the wealth will just trickle right on down.
 
Look for the national debt to be 30 trillion or some shit by 2020, because of these massive tax cuts for the 1%.

I think I would have to sell my house if they cut the mortgage tax deduction. I am not upper middle class

And guess who would buy it? A 1%er to rent it out to some one like you and not allow any equity to develop.This is a huge problem and having equity in something when you are 50 and 60 really helps for planning retirement. If renting out a house or apartment your whole life stays the same price as what it cost to actually own, at least in the very recent past, then we are going to be working until we are 80.
 
I agree with simplifying the tax code. Not even outraged at the drop in 35% to 15%. We need to make it easier for small businesses to exist without legions of accountants and lawyers to game to the tax code. Mortgage interest deduction just favors the upper middle class with expensive homes right now.

However, for whatever reason I don't trust these guys to make decisions that will help the majority of Americans in the long run.

Easy solution: simple progressive taxation on businesses with no loop holes. Make the lower income brackets where most small and medium businesses reside a manageable set of tax rates, while huge multinational corporations have to pay the higher rate. If multinationals incorporated and/or selling in the US try to hide money offshore, their assets for what they owe domestically are seized. No more fucking around.
 

Kabouter

Member
The taxation stuff seems fairly sensible, mortgage interest deductions need to be killed (though obviously with care to avoid too much of a shock to the housing market such deductions have distorted), and America's corporate tax rate has been too high for ages. That said, I anticipate no drastic acceleration of growth, and if the reforms are executed poorly, it will result in a large increase in government deficits. I'm willing to give it the benefit of the doubt however.

The trade stuff remains worrying though, trade wars are no joke.

Easy solution: simple progressive taxation on businesses with no loop holes. Make the lower income brackets where most small and medium businesses reside a manageable set of tax rates, while huge multinational corporations have to pay the higher rate. If multinationals incorporated and/or sellng in the US try to hide money offshore, their assets are seized. No more fucking around.

Maybe instead of this nonsense, America should stop trying to tax income generated abroad just because the corporation in question just happens to be incorporated in the US.
 
The taxation stuff seems fairly sensible, mortgage interest deductions need to be killed (though obviously with care to avoid too much of a shock to the housing market such deductions have distorted), and America's corporate tax rate has been too high for ages. That said, I anticipate no drastic acceleration of growth, and if the reforms are executed poorly, it will result in a large increase in government deficits. I'm willing to give it the benefit of the doubt however.

The trade stuff remains worrying though, trade wars are no joke.



Maybe instead of this nonsense, America should stop trying to tax income generated abroad just because the corporation in question just happens to be incorporated in the US.

I said what they owe domestically.

It's not nonsense either. They are committing theft at the highest level possible, and it is hollowing out our country.
 
Everyone I know is middle class. Everyone i know neexsnthe morrgage deductions in California. Why does everyone think this deduction only benefits the rich and why does everyone want to get rid of it?
 
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