Senator Marsha Blackburn clearly struggles with math. She claimed to have “receipts” of a $1.9 Trillion bill but only listed generic categories that added up to $547 million. The fraction of the bill that she accounted for in the most generic terms was 1/3800. That’s about .03% . Not 3%, but .03 %. Her complaints were about arts, museums, libraries, education, climate justice, a subway, and Planned Parenthood. Maybe in very red Tennessee, they oppose education, justice, the arts, libraries, and want climate change to continue to hurt marginalized communities. There, they may oppose women’s bodily autonomy and be big forced birthers. However, she needs to understand that America writ large doesn’t agree with her and when Tennessee is way out of step with the rest of the nation, then the rest of the nation’s views are going to prevail. In any event, she generically accounted for only $3 out of every $10,000 in the bill. That’s not a receipt of anything, especially as generic as it is. Well, it is a receipt or proof that she’s a moron. She’s going to complain about how $3 of every $10,000 is spent on the bill and think she has anything ? Really ?
Many of us were not happy that Senator King Manchin reduced the ceiling on who would receive the direct payments. However, it turns out that 85% of Americans will get that direct payment. And without him, this bill doesn’t pass and nobody gets this direct payment or all of the other great things that this bill does. Obviously, I completely disagree with Senator Manchin regarding the $15/hr minimum wage and the filibuster. We need the democracy bill which passed the US House of Representatives to become law. It is incomprehensible to me that he would not at least be willing to create an exception around the filibuster for this type of bill. Does he really support voter suppression ? He only won narrowly last time and voter suppression could hurt him politically. The US Senate is divided 50-50 and yet if you add up all the votes for all Democratic Party candidates for US Senate in the general election for all cohorts and compare it to the vote total for the Republican Party counterparts, then you find that we won 27 million more votes. In any country, it is possible for a 35 to 40% minority of the electorate to back a Hitler type candidate. Hitler won election with only about a third of the vote. Allowing a minority, not even a plurality, of the electorate to completely determine the composition of the federal government is extraordinarily dangerous. 74 million American voters backed a maniac who allowed 520,000 Americans to die unnecessarily from a pandemic and who incited an insurrection. That’s the danger of allowing a minority which is not even a plurality of the electorate to determine the composition of the federal government. Bill Barr clearly acted as if his job was to be the president’s personal attorney, not the Attorney General for the United States. While the democracy bill won’t cure the great ills of our system of government, it would at least help to safeguard democracy somewhat more than it is protected now. Every other legislation we need passed depends upon the vote. Thus, the democracy bill is foundational. Nor should it be partisan in theory.
Furthermore, the only theoretical benefit of having the filibuster other than letting the minority run roughshod over the majority is to force an actual debate. If legislation is so dangerous in the view of the minority that it should be filibustered and consider the likely percentage of support from voters if it is supported by a majority of senators from 50 to 59, then it should be important enough for that minority of senators to actually speak about the bill itself and for all of them to be present for an actual filibuster. That’s what the filibuster was originally created for. Now, it no longer serves any purpose other than allowing an easy way to prevent the majority of voters from realizing their political needs through a majority of senators. It’s now too easy to stop legislation and it is using the filibuster in a way that it was not intended to be used. Even if you wanted to keep the same numerical requirements for ending debate on a bill (which may mean requiring 70+% of the electorate to agree on the bill for it to become law which is ludicrous), you could at least make those who wish to stop the will of the majority (if it doesn’t have enough votes to pass with a majority then why filibuster it, why not just defeat it with a majority no vote ? ) actually debate on the item and if it is indeed that important to the minority of senators, then actually be present during the filibuster and truly debate it to death ? I can’t come up with any rational, reasonable answer to this and I would absolutely love to hear any attempt to rebut this from King Manchin.
Returning to the main topic of the diary, determining what would be found worthwhile in the bill is clearly subjective. Still, I find it hard to imagine that funding for the following items would not have the support of a large majority of voters:
$424 billion — direct payments of $1400
$350 billion -— state and local aid , prevent layoffs and and loss of services
$246 billion — unemployment insurance
$219 billion -— tax credits, child care for families and aid
$178 billion -— reopen schools and higher education
$176 billion -— vaccinations and health care
At a minimum, I would be very confident that at least 55+% of voters would support all of the above and likely more. Rounding this, I found this to be about 16 / 19 — about 84% if my mental math is correct. 1.593 again mental math . (add first and last — even six hundred, the two before the last together is 400 minus three — 9=10-1, 8=10-2 , 1+2=3 so I owe 3, adding six and four and I get ten hundred or one thousand, the two below the top are 5.96 easily and so we have 1.596 but I owe 3, and thus 1.593) [the 16 / 19 — clearly 5.25*19 is about 100 (99.75) and 5*16 = 80 obviously and one fourth of 16 is 4 and so 80+4 =84 ]
So, I would think at least fix sixths of this has very strong support and I am not sure that the rest is unpopular . Who would oppose aid to veterans ? Clearly, food is essential and so farming is hardly likely to be unpopular, small businesses create two thirds of all new jobs and that isn’t likely to be unpopular, the public knows that restaurants need support due to the pandemic and even bars may not be unpopular, disaster relief would certainly not be controversial, FEMA would not be controversial, renters and homeowners is this likely to be controversial ? Other who knows…
The point of this is that republicans are going to have a hard time convincing anybody but their hard core base that the bill is not mostly going towards areas that the voters support. The main thing that voters will be thinking about with the bill will be the $1400 direct payments and that’s the largest and most popular item. Only 10 of 50 republicans would sign onto any direct payments, their direct payments capped at 100,000 for couples and 50,000 for singles, it reduced as it went up and it was based upon 2019 income when there was not a pandemic.
Frankly, I can’t believe that they would say a word in public about federal spending without turning bright red. They know and we know and the American public knows that these @#$@#$@#$ passed a $2 Trillion bill which was tax cuts for the wealthy . Every one of these Senate republicans knows what the nonpartisan CBO said about their tax cuts for the wealthy? It’s astonishing that they would have the chutzpah to say one word about deficits after every single Senate Republican voted for their tax cuts for the wealthy ! Every republican president since 2000 has left America in a weakened economy, a recession. President Reagan didn’t reduce the deficit. The last republican president to reduce the deficit was before President Reagan. The last two democratic presidents have both reduced the deficit, both President Bill Clinton and President Barack Obama. Clearly, republicans don’t mind spending money or increasing the deficit. It’s just that they want to give that money to wealthy white people. Democrats reduce the deficit while trying to reduce inequality and lift up people of color, marginalized communities, and the poor and middle class.
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On December 21, 2017, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) released its distribution estimate of the Act:
- During 2019, income groups earning under $20,000 (about 23% of taxpayers) would contribute to deficit reduction (i.e., incur a cost), mainly by receiving fewer subsidies due to the repeal of the individual mandate of the Affordable Care Act. Other groups would contribute to deficit increases (i.e., receive a benefit), mainly due to tax cuts.
- During 2021, 2023, and 2025, income groups earning under $40,000 (about 43% of taxpayers) would contribute to deficit reduction, while income groups above $40,000 would contribute to deficit increases.
- During 2027, income groups earning under $75,000 (about 76% of taxpayers) would contribute to deficit reduction, while income groups above $75,000 would contribute to deficit increases.[89][92]
CBO stated that lower income groups will incur costs, while higher income groups will receive benefits: "Overall, the combined effect of the change in net federal revenue and spending is to decrease deficits (primarily stemming from reductions in spending) allocated to lower-income tax filing units and to increase deficits (primarily stemming from reductions in taxes) allocated to higher-income tax filing units
.The Act is based on tax reform advocated by congressional Republicans and the Trump administration.[7] The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO) reported that under the Act individuals and pass-through entities like partnerships and S corporations would receive about $1.125 trillion in net benefits (i.e. net tax cuts offset by reduced healthcare subsidies) over 10 years, while corporations would receive around $320 billion in benefits. The CBO estimates that implementing the Act would add an estimated $2.289 trillion to the national debt over ten years,[8] or about $1.891 trillion after taking into account macroeconomic feedback effects, in addition to the $9.8 trillion increase forecast under the current policy baseline and existing $20 trillion national debt.
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Below is more analysis of the Trump tax cuts for the wealthy.
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The analysis of the Trump tax cut for the wealthy revealed that it was horrific.
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The national debt is on track to approach 100 percent of gross domestic product (GDP) by 2028, said the nonpartisan CBO, which analyzes legislation for Congress.
“That amount is far greater than the debt in any year since just after World War II,” CBO said, adding that the debt is now about 77 percent of GDP, a measure of the size of the economy. The Republican tax legislation, passed by Congress without Democratic support, along with a recent bipartisan $1.3 trillion spending package, are expected to drive economic growth faster than initially expected, CBO said.
Real GDP will grow by 3.3 percent in 2018; 2.4 percent in 2019; and 1.8 percent in 2020, it said.
But those growth rates will not offset the deficits, which will “increase rapidly this year and over the next few years,” then stabilize, resulting in a projected cumulative deficit of $11.7 trillion for 2018-2027, CBO forecast.
The analysis “confirms that major damage was done” by the new tax law and the spending bill, said Michael Peterson, head of the nonpartisan Peter G. Peterson Foundation.
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The analysis of it reveals that it was very bad.
Rather than give hardworking Americans the raise they were promised, corporations spent their windfall on nearly $1 trillion in stock buybacks that overwhelmingly benefitted wealthy stockholders.3
While Trump and Republicans have pointed to the one-time bonuses corporations announced at the end of 2017, CRS also confirmed that the bonuses were a public relations stunt, noting that “reported bonuses were equivalent to about $28 per U.S. worker. And many were announced so firms could deduct the cost at their higher 2017 tax rate of 35 percent instead of the 2018 rate of 21 percent.”5
. Two years after multinational corporations received a trillion dollar windfall, investment is down, not up, and higher than projected rates of job creation and economic growth have not materialized.
.One analysis of Fortune 500 companies found that just 20 percent of increased cashflow in 2018 was spent on increasing capital expenditures or research and development. The remaining 80 percent of cashflow went to investors through buybacks, dividends, or other asset planning adjustments.
President Trump and congressional Republicans laughably promised that the tax cuts would pay for themselves through increased economic growth. No experts agreed with this assessment at the time, and the Congressional Budget Office ultimately concluded that the bill would add nearly $1.5 trillion to the deficit.10As was predicted, the deficit has exploded. CRS estimates the tax cuts reduced federal revenue by approximately $170 billion in Fiscal Year 2018 alone,11 and CBO projects the deficit will exceed $1 trillion per year beginning in 2022
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The analysis of the tax cuts reveals that it did not help lower wage workers.
.1. It ignores the stagnation of working-class wages and exacerbates inequality.
The tax law’s tilt to the most well-off exacerbates racial inequities.
Cutting corporate taxes
A 20 percent deduction for pass-through income.
Doubling the estate tax exemption
Cutting individual income tax rates for those at the top
. It weakens revenues at a time when the nation needs to raise more
It encourages rampant tax gaming and risks undermining the integrity of tax code
Law Does Relatively Little for Low- and Moderate-Income Americans — and Hurts Many
2017 Tax Law Largely Left Behind Low- and Moderate-Income People
Increased the CTC in a way that largely left behind millions of working families, while doing much more for high-income families (twenty six million only got from one dollar more to seventy five dollars more)
The largest CTC increases go to high-income families
Ignored the Earned Income Tax Credit, a critical tool for boosting workers’ incomes
Provisions That Hurt Many Low- and Moderate-Income Households (incentivized companies to switch jobs out to contractors)
(incentivized shifting profits and investment offshore)
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Analysis of that tax cut revealed that it was “socialism for the rich”
Because many anti-poverty programs are “means-tested” — eligibility is a function of income — receipts of those benefits go down when the economy goes up. Tax cuts, however, have the opposite effect. As incomes rise, they just keep giving. Thus, with unemployment at a 50-year low, we would expect a tax cut tilted toward the wealthy to raise incomes at the top, and at the same time, transfer programs deliver less to the bottom. In other words, a recipe for higher inequality.
CBO predicts that between 2016 and 2021, the share of income going to the bottom and middle fifths will fall slightly, while that going to the top fifth grows by 1.2 percentage points, with the majority of that gain (0.9) coming from the top 1 percent.