Chuck Grassley: “some might ask how does Joint Tax conclude that the bipartisan tax relief made the tax code more progressive. The answer…”

“some might ask how does Joint Tax conclude that the bipartisan tax relief made the tax code more progressive. The answer is that the bipartisan tax relief returns to taxpayers, on a progressive basis, a small portion of the record level of Federal taxes. Take a look at this chart. It shows that the largest tax cut went to taxpayers in the lower and middle income brackets. For instance, taxpayers with incomes between $10,000 and $20,000, will see their taxes reduced by almost 14 percent when the tax cut is fully in effect. Taxpayers with over $200,000 will see their taxes reduced by barely 6 percent. The Democratic Leadership and many in the media, will focus, not on the burden taxpayers bear, but on the benefits of the tax cut. In other words, they will try to ignore the progressive nature of our current system and use isolated examples. For instance, they will say that a taxpayer at $50,000 of income gets more of a tax cut than a taxpayer at $10,000 of income. In fact, a taxpayer at $50,000 of income, pays considerably more tax than a taxpayer at $10,000 of income. Comparing two different taxpayers' tax relief benefits without looking at the burden is comparing apples to oranges. Let us compare apples to apples. That is, the burden born by groups of taxpayers before and after the tax relief bill.”