It's a little early to tell as it's not at all clear this plan will make it through...most likely not in its current condition...it has several steps yet to go through before it will reach trump's desk. It will also depend on things such as what state you are in and if you itemize deductions or not based on the elimination of the property tax deduction.

So far, what I've heard, on the nightly news last night....people who make $85k or less, your tax rate will be cut in half and your standard deduction will double. ie: 25% tax bracket, will now be 12.5% and $6500 ded for a single person would now be $13K. So a lot of people that used to itemize will no longer have an advantage....they'd just be able to fill out a few lines and file it themselves.... saving money on tax preparation as well. Last I heard, property tax & mortage deductions had not changed ....as previously planned.

Today's NYT article says that what one ends up paying is more complex than just the tax rate due to the many changes in deductions that are planned.

I'll be watching as more educated people than I analyze it. And trying to see it from the perspective of a variety of people -- richer, poorer, older, younger, healthy, chronically ill, etc.

With tax legislation, there are normally many changes and sometimes very substantial changes, to both add and subtract provisions, that will occur between when a bill is proposed and when anything is enacted. It's very much too soon to think about it.

The perfect record of this Congress (.000 batting average) in passing legislation, which I'm very grateful for considering what they've tried but failed to do so far, is yet another wrinkle to think about when listening to proposed law changes.

What I find shocking about the bill is the start date. If it gets enacted by the end of the year? January 1. If it's after, it's still retroactive to January 1. No pressure there to get all the tax software done, is there? Strange that it's so fast moving.

rob, it's not unusual that law changes in a tax bill when enacted have retroactive effect. I've never thought about it in this way but I think that's always or almost always the case in whole or part.

I more meant, November to January. I guess I've never watched so closely. Seems like it'd have to get through committees and have discussions to be a fair and well thought out thing. Maybe not. What do I know about taxes?

The saddest thing is that you've probably already spent more time trying to understand the bill, and its effects, than most of the rubber-stamp Republicans who will be voting for the bill ever will.

The projected deficit with this proposal is huge.

Just about every part of it needs an asterisk. It's dependent on such-an-such; If this, then that; details TBD. Foolish projections or complete lack of them.

Benefits at the high end last forever; benefits to the middle class phase out fast.

Unfair to eliminate deductions for medical expenses. Our costs total more than we spend on food.

I'd be unhappy with a $10K cap on RE taxes.

I agree with capping the amount of a mortgage on which interest can be deducted. However, a $500K mortgage isn't big everywhere; maybe an area's cost-of-living scale could be applied.

The House tends to be 'populist' and may pass this. I hope the Senate would kill it, should it come to them in this form.

" I guess I've never watched so closely."

Haha. Washington DC these days is rather more like the Twilight Zone than the nation's capital. Let me suggest to you that now is not the right time to watch anything political. Or to expect anything normal in terms of process or bill development.

For me and my children a $10,000 cap on real estate taxes would have no effect on us. I don't itemize anyhow but I do my son's taxes and he itemizes. In my opinion $10,000 in property tax indicates someone above what I consider middle class

It's too bad they don't have a cost of living scale. We own an expensive home with high property taxes only because we have to in order to live in this area where my husband works, but I still consider us middle class. We just have to pay a lot more for housing.

Rose, there are very many places in the US, typically in or near urban/metro areas, where average home prices are $700K and higher. At a 1.5% annual tax rate (and many places it's over 2%), you get to annual taxes in excess of $10,000. If you live in a small town or rural setting, the situation you face and your experience with how much homes and property taxes cost would be extremely different.

.people who make $85k or less, your tax rate will be cut in half

No. For instance, for the poorest poor, those who make less than about $10K a year, their taxes will rise. For many people they will go up some, since there are fewer brackets and at the lower end, they replaced the lower brackets with just the next step up. So for a couple making $18,000 a year, their tax will go from 10% to 12%, which may not seem like much, but if you're in that desperate of a situation it surely does not help.

Here are graphs of the new brackets. Top is for couples filing jointly, bottom is for singles:

Rose Pekelnicky, with respect, I don't think you don't live in NJ. Property taxes here are outrageous for properties that have been owned and paid off for decades. NJ homeowners and state taxpayers would be negatively impacted by the bill as currently structured.

I will say I must have been wrong. I have lived all my life in the NW corner of Pennsylvania. I have a 13 room farmhouse (100+ yrs old but maintained and nicely remodeled) on 5 acres of land. There are 3 large outbuildings too. My taxes are $2600 a year. This is what I based my observation on.

Rose, if you were closer to the SE section of the state, your taxes would be tripled, easily, and more the closer you get to more dense areas.

>>This is what I based my observation on.>>

Understandable; it's what valid for you. I have a good friend who lives outside Kennett Square PA with a property very similar to yours. Quite lovely!

But since 80% of the US population lives in cities (like me and all my family, including extended members), it's likely there will be a sizable number of winners and losers under whatever GOP tax plan is eventually passed.

Big winners will be Trump and the 1%:

- Elimination of the estate tax. Even if phased in - "....According to a 2015 report from Congress's Joint
Committee on Taxation, only 4,700 estate tax returns reporting tax liability
were filed in 2013, out of 2.6 million total deaths in the United States."

- Alternative Minimum Tax repeal. Trump would have saved $26M of his $31M tax liability in 2005 if not for the AMT. You can be pretty sure the Koch Bros. and the Mercer family are dancing for joy behind closed doors, on both proposed tax repeals.

Whatever the final bill looks like, it will pass via simple majority vote, instead of the normal 60-vote requirement. Slam-dunk for the GOP agenda. Just a matter of which industry groups they're willing to listen to, to come up with the final compromise reform bill.

Ah, the irony: having to depend on corporate industry groups to push for more middle-class tax relief!

Remember, too, the top bracket cuts are permanent in this plan, but the middle class benefits are structured to phase out over a few years.

Compounded wealth is a real problem in the US. We have become an oligarchy.

The rules contained in the current tax laws represent changes from what had been enacted before that a different political party didn't like. If anything gets passed under this administration (to change what now exists that they don't like), you can be sure the cycle will be repeated in the future. So, no need for gloom and doom, any changes will likely be temporary as always.

chisue, sometimes your words sound almost like you'd prefer a dictatorship of the proletariat. I hope you don't really think so but really no one is out to get you or anyone else. There are no conspiracies at work, just the normal ebb and flow of opinions and power.

Elmer -- Do you not see today's Robber Barons destroying the middle class necessary to a republic? A One Percent is no different from the entitled ruling class of the monarchies that our ancestors fled.

The United States is a unique experiment. It won't necessarily right itself by itself.

The Republicans always talk about wanting to return to better times of the past, but they're vague about the what "better times" they mean. Baby boomers hear this and imagine the post-war era. With the booming industrial economy, abundant jobs, rapidly growing middle class, and broad reaching prosperity for all. However not only is that rosy image not especially accurate, it is not the "better times" the Republicans actually mean. They want to bring back the days of the late 1800's when robber baron strode the land like gods, unfettered in their endless rapacious greed by distractions like having to pay taxes, or annoying regulations, such as child labor laws or clean air or clean water laws, or banking and investment laws enacted in response to the massive economic crashes.

They've been steadily chipping away these laws that allowed the middle class to come into existence and flourish, and yet they continue to convince the middle class that somehow giving all the money to the rich people will somehow benefit the middle class.

Bob, That was Ronald Reagan's great conjuring trick- convincing most Americans to vote against their own self interest in the hopes of winning the lottery.

writersblock, your statement about the tax rate for a couple making $18,000 seems misleading. If they make $18,000 and the standard deduction is doubled to $24,000, they would have a negative gross income, whereas at the present time, the standard deduction is $12,000, so a couple making $18,000 would pay tax on $6,000 of adjusted gross income (AGI).

To state it in simple terms, for a couple making $18,000, current tax would be $600 (10% of AGI); proposed tax would be $0 (12% of AGI of less than zero).

"Do you not see today's Robber Barons destroying the middle class necessary to a republic?"

No, I don't. What do you see happening?

"The United States is a unique experiment. "

I don't see this, what are you referring to? Other than our size, facilitated only by geography, we're pretty similar to other developed countries in most respects.

"A One Percent is no different from......."

I think this term has become trite and meaningless. Any sample of anything has a top one percent, a bottom one percent, a top quartile, a bottom quartile, etc.

Bob just laid it out, Elmer. You see no problem when one percent of a population holds 80% of the wealth of that nation -- while a huge percentage in the 'middle' steadily loses net worth? What 'balance' of wealth between rich and poor looks like the land of opportunity to you?

One cornerstone of this "tax bill" is to lower the top corporate rate from 35% to 20% apparently in the hopes that giant corporations who have set up sham headquarters overseas and who shift their money around through yet other countries and use accounting shenanigans to pretend that all of the profit occurs in countries with no income tax, thereby effectively paying zero tax on billions of dollars a year in profits, will decide to abandon these carefully wrought plans and voluntarily now pay 20% tax on those billions, instead of the 0% they currently pay. That is simply a ludicrous assumption. Instead what will happen is individuals who under this bill would be required to pay 39.5% on their massive income, will instead establish a sham corporation and pretend that the income is earned by that corporation and pay only 20% income tax on their millions.

Every time some talking head news reporter, or Republican party hack, or think tank spokesman appears to spout the lies and nonsense on which this bill is predicated, they should be required to disclose how much money they make, and how much less they personally would pay in taxes in this welfare-for-the-rich tax bill. I'll bet each and every one of them would gain more every year from this bill than the average American makes in a year.

Yeah, I don't see companies coming back to the US. It's all about money and you can pay workers in some other countries a tiny fraction of what a US worker would require.

They need to heavily tax any US-headquartered companies who have products or services completed in a different country. But we all know that won't happen. The Trump family hypocrites make a lot of money having their clothing lines made overseas.

Any guesses how much Trump et al would benefit? Oh, I forgot, we don't have his tax returns.

I heard he'd save a Billion.

The story

chisue (and indirectly for bob), everyone is entitled to their opinions but some opinions are better informed than others. I think both of you are sincere in how you feel but I spent a career in this field and think you both might feel differently with a deeper understanding.

chisue, there are millions and millions of middle class people in the US today who have adapted to the realities of our changing economy and are thriving from the current boom that's been going on for nearly 10 years. They happen to not be the unskilled and now unemployed factory workers in the Rust Belt who arguably were never more than overpaid manual laborers, if that's who you're thinking of as the declining middle class. Overpaid because of unreasonable union contracts. New auto plants have been built in the US but in the less unionized South. The manufacture of other products for which union contracts made labor unaffordable have been moved abroad. Consumers shop by price (everyone is guilty of that) and more expensive products lose out. See a pattern? It has nothing to do with politics or tax policies or robber barons. If you own any stock or mutual funds, then you're a robber baron too because your companies are trying to provide what their customers want at prices they want to pay.

chi, the issue about global companies favoring "operations" and funds in low tax countries is something I worked with myself as an adviser. It's probably the most misunderstood aspect of US multinational business that I can think of. Believe me when I say that US corporate tax rules have historically penalized US companies in certain ways compared to companies based in other developed countries. Some of the strategies that are employed are only to level the playing field financially concerning international competitors. There's nothing nefarious, nothing illegal, the tactics make US companies more competitive.

Who benefits are the shareholders and customers of these companies. If you want to benefit too, buy stock of a multinational company because its earnings and dividend payouts are enhanced by proper fiscal management. Or, would you rather they earn less? Lower returns would make capital more expensive and thereby services and products more expensive. That's not a better alternative.

And that mentality is why we are where we are. Who cares how factory workers in China are treated, as long as our prices are low and dividends are high, right? I can't stand this money-first capitalistic philosophy and I would much rather pay more for products that were produced by workers who were treated well. It's the same reason I pay 5x more for humane animal products. I don't believe in exploiting humans or animals for my own usage. Unfortunately at this point it's unavoidable to some extent because it's such a wide-spread practice but I do my best to minimize it.

chi, we're not the world's protector or nanny. China or other low labor cost areas are not our problem - but refusing to buy from companies that use explotative subcontractors is valid. But we need to learn how to mind our own business. Shades of our unrealistic "we need to lead the way" attitude are why we alone as a country have lost so many lives and wasted so many billions of dollars in meaningless parts of the world. And get stuck in places like Korea, or Vietnam, or Iraq/Afghanistan, etc., unable to leave them to their own lives and outcomes.

Go stand in front of a Walmart or Target and try to tell people that prices don't matter. If Walmart changed its procurement and decided to sell only American produced items, it would have no customers. Stand in front of a car dealer and try to tell shoppers they should pay the sticker price. Et cetera.

I agree with most of your idealism most of the time but idealism and reality don't always inhabit the same spaces in our world.

I am not suggesting that we are the world's nanny or that we should go to war to protect exploited workers. But companies do make the choice of where their production is handled. They are aware of the circumstances, and that there is a tradeoff for everything. Maximizing profits will almost always come at the expense of something else.

And I do realize that many people look at cost first for all purchasing decisions. Not everyone has the means to make ethical purchases. But I also think it's way too easy to be dismissive of current practices. A lot of people choose willful ignorance over truly thinking about the realities of what they are supporting with their money, across all industries.

Using meat as an example. Most people are aware and disagree with horrific factory farming. They have some knowledge of how those animals are treated, but still refuse to pay over X amount for meat and "try not to think about" what the animal went through (people have told me this). That's willful ignorance when there are other options available.

And yes, I am idealistic but that's okay. Someone has to be or nothing will ever change. Every little bit of good helps.

Pragmatists and realists get more accomplished than idealists. I think Sanders, for example, is an idealist and because of that I don't think he could ever stand a chance to be a serious national candidate. He has some good ideas, not all. He doesn't have much to say about how his goals could ever be attained or when he does, he glosses over consequences of other essential factors that may need to be changed, who knows how? While dreamers dream and suggest alternatives, builders and doers need to get things done.

I think there's room for both. Running the country does require a different outlook than someone trying to make better choices with their money, and I would agree that realism is important for a President. Luckily, I have no political ambitions so I can use my idealized dollars to try to support the industries I agree with.

Fair enough.

I had no doubt Elmer would chime in in defense of the large corporations, and offer advice like: rather than complain about the corporations efforts to avoid paying the taxes they are legally obligated to, instead you should buy stock in the company so that you can benefit from the dribs and drabs of ill-gotten-gains that spills forth from their over-full pockets.

I wasn't talking about moving manufacturing operations to third-world locations like China or Mexico or Alabama, where the responsibility of manufacturers to their workers amounts to: "Too bad, so sad, enjoy your cancer." or "Sorry about your missing limb, I hope that grows back" I was talking about schemes where the companies declare their "headquarters" to be a mail drop in a strip mall in Ireland, and then create fictitious subsidiaries in Ireland, The Netherlands, The Bahamas and/or Singapore and exploit dubious loopholes with clever names like: Double Irish with a Dutch Sandwich, Bermuda Black Hole, or Singapore Sling. These schemes to avoid paying taxes are not illegal only because the companies exploiting them have a cadre of accountants, lawyers and lobbyists working tirelessly to prevent the government from closing the loophole and making them illegal. And they are only "not nefarious" by a situational morality ruler of "All of those others are doing it too, therefore it is not morally/ethically wrong."

Using these Google paid a tax rate of 2.4% in 2009 on 5.5 billion euros in profit, while in a different year Apple paid approximately 1% in taxes using such schemes. Some half-assed efforts have been made to address these abuses, but rather than declaring that their use of these loopholes was illegal all along and demanding the companies pay the taxes they would have owed, plus penalties, like I would have to do if I engaged in tax fraud, instead the governments have said what you've done is wrong, but the punishment for doing so is nothing, and we'll give you until 2020 to continue this particular tax fraud while you look for new loopholes you can exploit to continue to avoid paying taxes.

If you are saying that you helped companies exploit these dubious tax avoidance schemes then you are part of the problem, and in my mind you are no less criminal than the companies that have done so.

There is nothing illegal about structuring your business in such a way as to avoid taxes. Corporations pay what they must. If the country wants to effect a change in the tax laws, then they should pass the necessary legislation.

Outrage and 'voting with my dollars' activism will not move the needle on these issues. There are complicated calculations involving jobs and revenue that must be made. The American electorate has all the tools it needs at its disposal to change the tax code. The problem is the electorate are not interested in the tax code.

Here is Phil Bullock's 2013 Senate testimony on behalf of Apple on these corporate taxation issues.

https://www.c-span.org/video/?312884-2/offshore-profit-sharing-panel-2

And I don't think it is fair to call Elmer a part of the problem. If memory serves, Elmer is a CPA. His job is to ensure his clients comply with any financial regulations that govern them.

Citizens don't get to decide what is criminal. We are still a country of laws.

bob, believe me when I suggest that you know and understand a lot less about this area than you think you do. These situations and the environments that global businesses operate in are vast, incredibly complex and subject to regulation and enforcement from more directions, agencies, and governments than a rotating radar could ever keep track of. Your comments and conclusions are facile and suggest it's something you're not well informed about.

Judge Learned Hand (a great name, don't you think, and a source of frequent quotes over the years by the public and other judges alike) once wrote "Over and over again courts have said that there is nothing sinister in so arranging one's affairs as to keep taxes as low as possible. Everybody does so, rich or poor; and all do right, for nobody owes any public duty to pay more than the law demands: taxes are enforced exactions, not voluntary contributions. To demand more in the name of morals is mere cant." In saying this, he's talking about arranging affairs in compliance with existing laws, not law breaking evasion or subterfuge.

As Rita said (thanks for the support, Rita) we're a nation of laws. Everyone is free to speak of changes they want. No one should consider the steps taken by any person or entity who fully complies with laws as they exist to be guilty of any kind of moral violation.

We've come full circle, talking about LAWS -- one that some of us find un-American. Can anyone deny that it aids the wealthy while doing nothing for anyone else?

Let's be careful about presuming that a whole 'class' of Americans can be consigned to some black hole of laid off wing nut tighteners who *failed* to get with the program. They sure aren't going to be able to 'better themselves' when Betsy DeVos finishes polishing off public education.

There is nothing good in this law. Nothing.

"Can anyone deny that it aids the wealthy while doing nothing for anyone else?"

If you're referring to tax laws (there are many, many more than one and they exist in every country) that set the framework for how companies operating in multiple countries are taxed in any one place......then yes, I can say that the ability to manage a tax profile (which will be done no matter what the laws are) in such a way as to reduce tax costs has the same effect as any program to manage any costs - it results in lower prices for goods and services paid by those who buy that company's output.

There are also a multiplicity of laws that lay out the framework of how companies that do business in more than one state (hundreds of thousands of such businesses) are to split their income between states, so as not to have to pay state tax based on more income than they have in total.

"Let's be careful about presuming that a whole 'class' of Americans can be consigned to some black hole of laid off wing nut tighteners"

American consumers got to the point where they were unwilling to continue to pay for products that were too expensive because costs included salaries of $80,000 per year plus benefits for unskilled but unionized wing nut tighteners. So they were replaced in either non-union locations or offshore so that each company's products in turn would be more price competitive. Blame the unions for decades of inflexibility that resulted in bloated wage contracts that essentially forced closures and job losses in the Rust Belt.

Its all well and good to say we're a nation of laws or that the electorate has any say or control over those laws, but that completely side steps the issue that in many cases the companies that are engaging these tax avoidance schemes either had a hand in the law being written in the first place through lobbying and bluster or outright buying of legislators, or more often in the interpretation of the law through accountants and lawyers in court cases and dealings with the IRS.

So it is disingenuous to say they aren't breaking the law, since the law is effectively what they have paid for it to be. Apple's headquarters is and always has been in Cupertino, California and just this year they've built a new even larger headquarters there, yet through a complex fiction of sham subsidiaries and shell corporations all of their profit is deemed to have occurred in Ireland. So yes there is complexity involved, but some of the complexity is created by the companies involved to distract, confuse and befuddle those who are supposed to enforce the tax law.

Furthermore saying the electorate could do something to change this if only they had the will is laughable, The electorate is only ever offered the choice between candidates that have already received the approval of powerful corporations and the wealthy by dint of the huge sums of money that is needed for a candidate to run for office. Additionally since all the major media outlets are owned by major corporations, they can poison the minds of the electorate against candidates that don't meet with their approval, sometimes before the candidate has even decided to run for an office.

bob, over 35 years of professional practice in this world make me an expert. You're not.

You also don't want to hear a view that's infinitely more knowledgeable than your own. You've done the forum equivalent of sticking your fingers in your ears and hum the Star Spangled Banner so that you don't hear information that contradicts your own uninformed view. That's fine, I have nothing further to say.