Trump Tax Policies

brief December 12, 2024
Federal Tax Debate 2025

Congress will soon debate provisions from the Trump tax law that are set to expire at the end of 2025, as well as other tax policies that Trump proposed on the campaign trail. Here we examine what’s at stake as lawmakers consider significant changes to our tax system.
blog November 21, 2024
The Impact of Trump’s Proposed Tariffs

The tariffs proposed by Donald Trump, which are far larger than any on the books today, would significantly raise the prices faced by American consumers across the income scale.
blog November 8, 2024
Tax Justice in the Crosshairs

Billionaires and businesses have too much power in Washington. Tax revenue is needed to pay for things we all need. If we want economic justice, racial justice and climate justice, we must have tax justice.
blog October 23, 2024
How Would the Harris and Trump Tax Plans Affect Different Income Groups?

Presidential candidates Kamala Harris and Donald Trump have put forward a wide range of different tax proposals during this year’s campaign. We have now fully analyzed the distributional impacts of the major proposals of both Vice President Harris and former President Trump in separate analyses. In all, the tax proposals announced by Harris would, on average, lead to a tax cut for all income groups except the richest 1 percent of Americans, while the proposals announced by Trump would, on average, lead to a tax increase for all income groups except the richest 5 percent of Americans.
report October 7, 2024
A Distributional Analysis of Donald Trump’s Tax Plan

Former President Donald Trump has proposed a wide variety of tax policy changes. Taken together, these proposals would, on average, lead to a tax cut for the richest 5 percent of Americans and a tax increase for all other income groups.
report September 13, 2024
Extending Temporary Provisions of the 2017 Trump Tax Law: Updated National and State-by-State Estimates

The TCJA Permanency Act would make permanent the provisions of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017 that are set to expire at the end of 2025. The legislation…
report March 12, 2024
Revenue-Raising Proposals in President Biden’s Fiscal Year 2025 Budget Plan

President Biden’s most recent budget plan includes proposals that would raise more than $5 trillion from high-income individuals and corporations over a decade. Like the budget plan he submitted to Congress last year, it would partly reverse the Trump tax cuts for corporations and high-income individuals, clamp down on corporate tax avoidance, and require the wealthiest individuals to pay taxes on their capital gains income just as they are required to for other types of income, among other reforms.
blog September 15, 2023
Kyrsten Sinema’s Latest Fight to Protect Tax Breaks for Private Equity

Sen. Sinema’s bill to stop a seemingly arcane business tax increase that was enacted as part of the 2017 Trump tax law would be hugely beneficial to the private equity industry.
blog May 9, 2023
The House’s Debt Ceiling Smoke Screen: The GOP Budget Plan Gives Cover for Tax Cuts for the Rich

While it isn’t reasonable in the first place for Congress to debate whether it will pay the bills it has already incurred, some of the same lawmakers who are holding the economy hostage to exact budget cuts have decided to make the conversation even more irrational by proposing to increase deficits with tax cuts that enrich the already rich.
report May 4, 2023
Extending Temporary Provisions of the 2017 Trump Tax Law: National and State-by-State Estimates

The push by Congressional Republicans to make the provisions of the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act permanent would cost nearly $300 billion in the first year and deliver the bulk of the tax benefits to the wealthiest Americans.
blog December 6, 2022
Reversing the Stricter Limit on Interest Deductions: Another Huge Tax Break for Private Equity

Private equity is doing fine on its own and does not need another tax break. Congress should keep the stricter limit on deductions for interest payments —one of the few provisions in the 2017 tax law that asked large businesses to pay a little bit more.
blog April 20, 2021
SALT Cap Repeal Would Worsen Racial Income and Wealth Divides

A bipartisan group of 32 House lawmakers banded together to form the “SALT Caucus,” demanding elimination of the SALT cap. None of their arguments in favor of repeal change the fact that it would primarily benefit the rich and, according to new research, exacerbate racial income and wealth disparities.
report April 20, 2021
Not Worth Its SALT: Tax Cut Proposal Overwhelmingly Benefits Wealthy, White Households

A previous ITEP analysis showed the lopsided distribution of SALT cap repeal by income level. The vast majority of families would not benefit financially from repeal and most of the tax cuts would flow to families with incomes above $200,000.

This report builds on that work by using a mix of tax return and survey data within our microsimulation tax model to estimate the distribution of SALT cap repeal across race and ethnicity. It shows that repealing the SALT cap would be the latest in a long string of inequitable policies that have conspired to create the vast racial income and wealth gaps that exist today.
blog February 1, 2021
Dems, Don’t Repeal the SALT Cap. Do This Instead.

Ever since it was enacted as part of the Trump-GOP tax law, some Democrats in Congress have been pushing to repeal the cap on federal tax deductions for state and local taxes (SALT). Recently several Democratic members have suggested that repeal of the cap should be part of COVID relief legislation.

While the cap on SALT deductions is problematic, repealing it without making other reforms would result in larger tax breaks for the rich. Instead, lawmakers should consider ITEP’s proposal to replace the SALT cap with a broader limit on tax breaks for the rich that would accomplish Biden’s goal of raising income taxes on people making more than $400,000, as he proposed on the campaign trail.
report July 21, 2020
An Updated Analysis of a Potential Payroll Tax Holiday

ITEP estimates that if Congress and the president eliminated all Social Security and Medicare payroll taxes paid by employers and employees from Sept. 1 through the end of the year, 64 percent of the benefits would go the richest 20 percent of taxpayers and 24 percent of the benefits would go to the richest 1 percent of taxpayers, as illustrated in the table below. The total cost of this hypothetical proposal would be $336 billion.
blog July 17, 2020
SALT Cap Repeal Has No Place in COVID-19 Legislation: National and State-by-State Data

The Trump-GOP tax law enacted at the end of 2017 includes a $10,000 cap on the amount of state and local taxes (SALT) that people can deduct on their federal tax returns, and this is one of the few limits the law places on tax breaks for high-income people. Unfortunately, it is also the provision that some Democrats are most determined to remove.
report July 14, 2020
Who Pays Taxes in America in 2020?

Having a sound understanding of who pays taxes and how much is a particularly relevant question now as the nation grapples with a health and economic crisis that is devastating lower-income families and requiring all levels of government to invest more in keeping individuals, families and communities afloat. This year, the share of all taxes paid by the richest 1 percent of Americans (24.3 percent) will be just a bit higher than the share of all income going to this group (20.9 percent). The share of all taxes paid by the poorest fifth of Americans (2 percent) will be just a bit lower than the share of all income going to this group (2.8 percent).
blog June 2, 2020
White House Incredibly Still Believes Tax Cuts Are the Answer to America’s Problems

White House officials continue to discuss tax cuts in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. Steve Wamhoff provides a roundup of these terrible ideas that would do little to boost investment or reach those who need it most.
report June 2, 2020
Depreciation Breaks Have Saved 20 Major Corporations $26.5 Billion Over Past Two Years

The Trump administration and its congressional allies have proposed making permanent the expensing provision in the Trump-GOP tax law. Expensing is the most extreme form of accelerated depreciation, which allows businesses to deduct the cost of purchasing equipment more quickly than it wears out. But expensing and other types of accelerated depreciation already account for a very large share of corporate tax breaks and allows many companies to pay nothing at all.
blog June 2, 2020
Trump-GOP Tax Law Encourages Companies to Move Jobs Offshore–and New Tax Cuts Won’t Change That

New tax cuts to incentivize bringing jobs back to the United States will fail. No new tax provisions can be more generous than the zero percent rate the 2017 law provides for many offshore profits or the loopholes that allow corporations to shift profits to countries with minimal or no corporate income taxes.
blog May 20, 2020
The HEROES Act Would Correct CARES Act Business Tax Mistakes

The Health Economic Recovery and Omnibus Emergency Solutions (HEROES) Act includes important changes to business tax provisions in the CARES Act, the most recent COVID-19 legislation enacted by Congress and…
blog April 24, 2020
The CARES Act Provision for High-Income Business Owners Looks Worse and Worse

A select group of millionaires will receive an average tax break of $1.6 million thanks to a CARES Act provision that is receiving delayed but well-deserved scrutiny. Wealthy business owners are receiving this windfall because the CARES Act provides tax breaks to people with losses from a business they own. This approach may seem sensible because businesses small and large are taking a hit from the economic recession, but on close inspection, these provisions benefit those least in need and can be easily abused.
blog April 24, 2020
Partying Like It’s 2017: How Congress Went Overboard on Helping Businesses with Losses

The Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act provides some needed relief for individuals and families, but two arcane tax provisions related to business losses will further enrich the wealthy and fail to boost our economy more broadly.
blog April 7, 2020
Addressing the COVID-19 Economic Crisis: Advice for the Next Round

Americans need many things right now beyond tax cuts or cash payments. But for people whose incomes have declined or evaporated, money is the obvious, immediate need to prevent missed rent or mortgage payments, skipped hospital visits and other cascading catastrophes. So, what should Congress do next to get money to those who need it?
blog April 6, 2020
Trump to Restaurant Owners: “Let Them Eat Skyboxes”

Last week, President Trump destroyed everyone’s coronavirus press conference bingo card by announcing that a conversation he had with celebrity chef Wolfgang Puck inspired him to propose restoring a corporate tax deduction for business entertainment expenses. Trump’s own signature tax plan repealed this break two years ago.