Senate Budget Focused on Tax Cuts for Rich
GOP’s New Budget Tries to Keep It Simple: Big Tax Cuts for the Rich, Not Much Else. NY Magazine: "The long-awaited draft Senate budget resolution for fiscal year 2018, which is significant for its role in “setting up” tax cuts that can be enacted with only 50 votes... allows a net $1.5 trillion increase in the deficit over ten years, which the House will probably accept... at this point the Senate’s keeping it simple with $1 billion in cuts (apparently in conjunction with abandoning some environmental projections) instead of a big assault on 'big' government... All in all, this is a pretty straightforward budget resolution that keeps the vehicle for tax cuts moving down the road. But Republicans have many, many miles to travel before they can be confident the FY 2018 budget process will be any more successful than its doomed FY 2017 predecessor."
GOP Understates True Costs of Corporate Tax Cuts
Republican tax plan may not be built to last.NYT: "A new analysis from the nonpartisan Tax Policy Center says the corporate tax cuts will cost nearly $7 trillion over the next two decades - $2.6 trillion over the next 10 years and another $4.1 trillion from 2028 through 2037. The hit would be somewhat offset by revenue raised from individual taxpayers over that same period - $470 billion over the next 10 years and an additional $1.4 trillion the next decade. But the entire package is expected to cost an estimated $5.6 trillion over the next 20 years - an amount that economists say would be hard to offset through economic growth alone. The ability to pay for the tax cuts matters because of Senate rules requiring legislation that adds to the federal deficit after a decade to expire. If Republicans can't show that a long-term tax cut will be deficit-neutral, they will have to scale back the size of the corporate tax cuts, make them temporary or find another way to pay for them."
Trump to Praise Own Anti-Regulation Efforts
Trump to point out efforts to undo Obama regulations. WaPo: "Without any major legislative accomplishments to point to despite the advantage of a Republican-controlled Congress, Trump on Monday is giving a speech highlighting his own directives to agencies, which have been ordered to cut two regulations for every new one imposed. There’s plenty for him to talk about, including dozens of executive orders and other scaling-back on a range of issues, from immigration policy to campus sexual assault. Executive orders are less enduring than legislation because a president can overturn a predecessor’s policy. Obama reversed some of President George W. Bush’s executive orders, and Trump’s will be reviewed by his successor. Neomi Rao, administrator of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, estimated that Trump’s regulations will save about $300 million annually, but she did not explain how Office of Management and Budget analysts came up with that number."
More from OurFuture.org:
Indians Don’t Pay Taxes? Or Why the Upcoming Tax Debate Matters So Much. Mark Trahant: "The myth that Indians don't pay taxes is widespread and won't fade away. In fact, the Senate's push to restructure the federal tax system, destroying entitlement programs in the process, will profoundly affect Indian Country."
Will Puerto Rico Be The Prequel to Global Post-Climate Change Dystopia? Miles Mogulescu: "In Puerto Rico, we may be seeing a prequel of what a post-climate change dystopian world may look like, and it's truly terrifying. That's why, after mitigating the damage, we must fight climate change as an existential threat to civilization."
