Ezra Klien wrote a great piece in the Washington Post about Tax Reform. Apparently Ron Widen and Judd Gregg are coming together to try to tackle the complications of our current tax code.
Klien Writes:
The Wyden-Gregg plan takes the six income brackets currently on the books and compresses them into three (15 percent, 25 percent and 35 percent). It gets rid of the alternative minimum tax. It triples the standard deduction available to all taxpayers, which means that people don’t need to spend as much time trying to itemize deductions and figuring out ways to game the system. It kills off the existing six corporate rates and eight corporate brackets, and replaces them with a flat corporate tax of 24 percent. And it reduces the task to a one-page form.
I must be dreaming. Not only are Republicans and Democrats coming together to reform the tax code. But it seems they are actually in agreement on many of the issues. The article does a great job explaining the need for reform, not only in terms of the complexities of our current system, but also addresses how long it has been since we have done anything. Apparently it has been over 25 years since we have had meaningful reform in terms of the tax code, and many agree it is long overdue.
According to Klien and others, the code needs to be scrubbed every 10 to 15 years. Because Congress would much rather just add a tax deduction then actually pay for a program. Which makes the code complicated, to say the least.
Klien quotes Bob McIntyre, of the Citizens for Tax Justice.
“If you’re getting rid of loopholes and lowering rates, you get winners and losers, not just losers. So all of a sudden it’s not only one side that cares. That’s especially true on the business side, which is where the real action is in tax reform and lobbying. That’s the dynamic that makes tax reform possible.”
Sounds like we’re all on board. Hopefully something can get done. On a side note, I really think the Health Care Bill needs to pass, but either way it needs to be put to bed. We simply have too many things that need to be accomplished. An up or down vote is needed soon.
Give Klien’s article a read, it’s a good one.