Taxes, Taxes, Taxes

Taxes, Taxes, Taxes

All right ladies and gentleman, the tax bill just passed the senate. While it still has to clear a few more hurdles and isn’t 100% passed yet, I think it’s important to discuss it. Please comment below with what you think about it, because for the better or worse, some BIG changes will be coming to our country if this passes. Below are my thoughts.

First of all, there is no doubt that this bill would spur economic growth in our country among businesses. The only problem is, that isn’t what we need right now. Our economy is at an all time high, and unemployment is at the lowest it can possibly get. In fact, even though unemployment is at 4.1% right now, economists say this is the lowest it can possibly go. People are constantly going to be unemployed because there are always people in between jobs, or laid off, etc. It is more or less impossible to make the number any lower at all.

Additionally, I think people need to move on and accept that some more traditional jobs like coal mining and phone call technical support are not jobs for our country any more because no matter how low our business taxes go, it will still be cheaper to send these jobs overseas.

Also, people in the US don’t really want to do these bottom of the totem pole jobs for their entire careers anymore, and they shouldn’t have to. If we want to make jobs, lets focus on better jobs instead. We can grow modern industries like renewable energy. Not only are the jobs in this field safer and better for the US in the long run, I would consider being a person that worked on installing solar panels to be a lot better job to have than being a steal worker.

In terms of middle class tax cuts, its hard to say what’s going to happen. I’ve read a lot of reports that say that it will be much better for the middle class in the long run, and a few that say the middle class will actually pay more. I hope it’s the first one.

But in terms of cutting taxes on the wealthy, I’m just going to say it. I don’t agree with it. For those that don’t know, the idea is that if there are lower taxes on the rich, they will invest more into the economy (startups, stocks, etc) and that will improve it, since they have the money. This concept is called trickle down.

The only problem is, this has been tried before in the US and it… didn’t work at all. The rich more or less held on to their money the same amount and just paid lower taxes. So, I see no reason to cut taxes on the super wealthy. They will always figure out a way to pay them no matter how high they are, and their spending on the US economy isn’t going to change at all.

The groups hit hardest by this bill are the upper middle class and low income families. You can check me on that.

There’s also a few miscellaneous things in and about the tax bill that I have opinions on.

First of all, I applaud the bill for attempting to close some loopholes and simplify the tax process. The bill seems to have fewer taxes, but also fewer deductions which I think is a move in the right direction.

The house bill and the senate bill are VERY different still. That isn’t good.

The bill is expected to add about one trillion to the national deficit which seems to be agreed upon by most people besides Republicans in congress, who think it will spur major economic growth and over compensate for the money lost to fund the government.

Additionally, Republicans in the past have been VERY opposed to growing the deficit, and have used it as a main argument against Democrats for many years, but now it seems not to matter as much.

Personally, here’s what I think. Debt always seems bad at first glance, but it is important to remember that debt is really important for the economy in the way it is used in the USA. While I don’t think adding 1 trillion is a good idea, I don’t think it is as bad as it looks because debt is not as big a deal as people think (in the way it is structured in the US, and in my opinion. I am in no way an expert on the merits of debt.)

The bill was submitted to everyone not very long (like a few hours) before it was voted on. The bill is over 500 pages long, so this is totally unacceptable. The timeline that Mr. Trump and the Republicans are trying to pass this on is also unacceptable.

For an overhaul this hard, things need to be carefully planned. In fact, the bill submitted to be passed still had HAND WRITTEN NOTES IN IT. Democratic senators posted on their twitters with videos of the bill, where you could SEE WITH YOUR OWN EYES THAT MANY PARTS OF THE BILL WERE ILLEGIBLE!!!

This is not ok. Democracy is a slow and careful process, and this is taking it and spitting on it. I think this is the pinnacle of sneaky government and I don’t think the Republicans should be allowed to get away with this. Regardless of the merits of contents, it should not be allowed to be passed like this. This timeline is insane.

 All right, that’s about it. Please comment your thoughts. I still have more to say for sure, and I want to know what others think!

For this and more great articles by columnist Sam Catania, visit his blog, The Lonely Politico.