‘A Bigger Tax Cut’

Average Savings Today Is 9.5% For The $20-30,000 Income Cohort, Vs. 7% Last Week

SEN. PAT TOOMEY (R-PA): “These [tax bill] iterations are getting better and better for working families, middle class, and in every cohort. So Mr. Barthold, let me ask you a couple of questions if I could. And I want to focus on taxes that people actually have to pay, not payments that the federal government makes to insurance companies. So let’s not focus on payments that my colleagues are absurdly suggesting is a tax increase. If you look at the actual taxes that are actually paid by human beings, and I look at the chart that was produced on November 11^th, I see reductions in every single cohort, every income cohort. Let’s take for instance the $20-30,000 cohort, the number on my sheet here is a 7% average reduction in taxes. Do you see that number?”

THOMAS BARTHOLD, Joint Committee On Taxation: “Which year, Sen. Toomey?”

TOOMEY: “I’m sorry, 2023.”

BARTHOLD: “The Senator is referring to JCX-53, which was the distribution analysis for the underlying chairman’s mark, and yes, in the $20-30,000 [range] we estimated that the total taxes collected attributable to that income group would fall by 7%.”

TOOMEY: “Right, and it falls in all the brackets.”

BARTHOLD: “It’s on page 3 of JCX-53-17, which was the distribution of the chairman’s mark before the modification.”

TOOMEY: “Which simply illustrates, contrary to what we’ve been hearing all week long, that every middle income tax cohort has a tax cut on average. And then, again putting aside the payments that the federal government makes to insurance companies which are ridiculous to consider taxes.  I know you ran a set of numbers, exclusive of that dynamic.  And I’ve got a chart up here for the calendar year 2023, that is the joint committee on taxation November 16, 2017 D-17-52.”

BARTHOLD: “Yes senator, you and the chairman had asked if we could distribute the effects of the mark, as modified absent the zero-rated individual mandate penalty and all effects of that.”

TOOMEY: “Right, and when you then look at $20-30,000 income cohort, the average savings now is not the 7% it was before, but it’s 9.5%”

BARTHOLD: “That’s correct, senator.”

TOOMEY: “And actually, every single cohort has a larger savings, which is to say a bigger tax cut, under this more recent version than the previous version, right?”

BARTHOLD: “That’s correct.”

TOOMEY: “So contrary to what our friend from Michigan said, every iteration is getting better.”

(U.S. Senate, Finance Committee, Hour 1:02:30, 11/16/2017)