Senate Democrats Tax Reform Principles

On 8/1/17, almost all Senate Democrats plus the two independent senators issued a letter to President Trump, Majority Leader McConnell and Senate Finance Committee Chairman Hatch, on their “key principles for tax reform.” The 45 signers indicate they want to work on bipartisan tax reform. The three key principles they “believe are prerequisites to any bipartisan tax reform effort” are:

1. Do not increase the tax burden on the middle class and should not benefit the wealthiest individuals.
2. The legislation should go through the normal bill approach (60 votes) rather than reconciliation. They do not want to see “partisan short-term tax cuts that would result in economic uncertainty and instability and significantly increase our budget deficit.”
3. “Tax reform should be focused on providing a revenue base that meets the needs of our country.  Deep cuts to our corporate, individual, and other tax rates are very costly.  We will not support any effort to pass deficit-financed tax cuts, which would endanger critical programs like Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security and other public investments in the future.”

Per the New York Times, absent from the signature list are three senators up for re-election in 2018– Donnelly (IN), Manchin (WV) and Heitkamp (ND) (Alan Rappeport, “After Health Care Victory, Senate Democrats Seek Compromise on Tax Plan,” 8/1/17).

What do you think?