Democrats: $625B Tax Cut for Wealthy Elite ‘Essential’ Ahead of Midterms
Democrats say cutting hundreds of billions of dollars in taxes for mostly wealthy income-earners in coastal states is “essential” to getting reelected in this year’s midterm elections.
In November, House Democrats passed President Joe Biden’s “Build Back Better Act” which includes billions in tax breaks to the wealthiest residents of blue states. Specifically, the plan would give a tax cut to about 67 percent of the nation’s richest Americans — those earning more than $885,000 every year — costing taxpayers about $625 billion.
Under Biden’s plan, those in the top one percent would receive an average tax cut of more than $16,000 this year. The tax cuts for the wealthy would be a result of the plan’s increasing the State and Local Tax (SALT) deduction cap.
Ahead of the midterm elections in November, House Democrats are warning their rich donors that they must get out and vote for them to secure the massive tax cut. Rep. Sean Patrick Maloney (D-NY) called the tax cuts for the rich “essential” in an interview with Bloomberg News.
“We need to get that done. It’s not the only thing, but it’s a big thing,” Maloney said, who represents one of New York’s wealthiest areas — Westchester County. Rep. Haley Stevens (D-MI) called the tax cut “really important” for her constituency.
“If you want your state and local deductions back, you have to vote for Democrats. Republicans screwed you last time, and they’ll do it again,” Maloney said.
At the same time, a number of Democrats are blasting the effort, including Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY), Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT), and Rep. Jared Golden (D-ME).
Sanders has said:
At a time of massive income and wealth inequality, the last thing we should be doing is giving more tax breaks to the very rich. Democrats campaigned and won on an agenda that demands that the very wealthy finally pay their fair share, not one that gives them more tax breaks.
Meanwhile, Democrats want to squeeze an extra $200 billion out of American taxpayers by mostly targeting working and middle class earners with more Internal Revenue Services (IRS) audits.
The plan ensures nearly 600,000 more working and middle class Americans earning $75,000 or less a year would be audited by the IRS. Of those new IRS audits, more than 313,000 would target the poorest of Americans who earn $25,000 or less a year.
In 2017, former President Trump had the SALT deduction capped at $10,000. Since then, Democrats have sought to deliver their wealthy, blue state donors with a massive tax cut by eliminating the cap altogether or greatly increasing it.
Biden, for instance, had sought to include tax cuts for his billionaire donors in a Chinese coronavirus relief package earlier this year. The plan was ultimately cut from the package. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA), in May 2020, also tried to include the plan in a coronavirus relief package.
John Binder is a reporter for Breitbart News. Email him at jbinder@breitbart.com. Follow him on Twitter here.
Be (Very) Afraid: World Economic Forum Expands List of Global Fears for 2022
Cyber attacks, militarization of space, extreme weather events, ecosystem collapse, social divisions, wars and the coronavirus pandemic. These are the key worries the World Economic Forum (WEF) highlighted Tuesday as reasons to be fearful for 2022.
A report released by the Switzerland-based organization, headed by founder and executive chairman Klaus Schwab, detailed the grim tidings ahead of the annual elite winter gathering of CEOs and world leaders in the ski resort of Davos.
The event has been postponed for a second year in a row because of coronavirus. WEF organizers still plan some virtual sessions next week, however its Global Risks Report 2022 makes for unpleasant reading.
It is based based on a survey of about 1,000 experts and leaders and in summary says:
WORLD OUTLOOK
The pandemic and its economic and societal impact still pose a “critical threat” to the world, the report said. Big differences between rich and poor nations’ access to vaccines mean their economies are recovering at uneven rates, which could widen social divisions and heighten geopolitical tensions.
By 2024, the global economy is forecast to be 2.3 percent smaller than it would have been without the pandemic. Commodity prices, inflation, and debt are rising in both the developed and developing worlds.
DIGITAL DISHARMONY
Attacks on critical infrastructure, misinformation, fraud and digital safety in 2022 will impact public trust in digital systems and increase costs for all stakeholders, the report said.
“We’re at the point now where cyberthreats are growing faster than our ability to effectively prevent and manage them,” said Carolina Klint, a risk management leader at Marsh, whose parent company Marsh McLennan co-authored the report with Zurich Insurance Group and SK Group.
SPACE RACE
The most immediate consequence of increased space activity is a higher risk of collision between near-Earth infrastructure and space objects, which could affect the orbits upon which key systems on Earth rely, damage valuable space equipment, or spark international tensions in a realm with few governance structures.
Growing militarization of space also risks an escalation of geopolitical tensions, particularly as space powers fail to collaborate on new rules to govern the realm, the report concludes.
CLIMATE THREATS
The environment remains the biggest long-term worry for all who responded to the survey.
The planet’s health over the next decade is the dominant concern, according to survey respondents, who cited failure to act on climate change, extreme weather, and loss of biodiversity as the top three risks.
WORLD BORDERS/DIPLOMACY
The report expresses the concern lingering effects of the coronavirus pandemic, increased economic protectionism and new labour market dynamics are inhibiting migrants migrants seeking to change countries for economic refuge.
Decreasing opportunities for orderly migration and the spillover effect on remittances risk forgoing a potential pathway to restoring livelihoods, maintaining political stability, and closing income and labour gaps, the report laments.
The WEF has previously floated its answers to a world of fear by promoting varying degrees of increased societal control under the guise of the self-described Great Reset, as Breitbart News reported.
The organization still calls for immediate action in 2022 to stave off all the above threats.
“Global leaders must come together and adopt a coordinated multi-stakeholder approach to tackle unrelenting global challenges and build resilience ahead of the next crisis,” Saadia Zahidi, WEF managing director, said.
AP contributed to this report.
Bidenflation: Consumer Prices Surge 7%, Worst Since 1982
U.S. inflation rose to the highest level in nearly forty years in December, underscoring the high and rising inflation that has been the hallmark of the first year of Joe Biden’s presidency.
The Labor Department said the Consumer Price Index—which tracks what consumers pay for goods and services—rose by seven percent from a year ago. That was the fastest 12-month pace since 1982 and the seventh straight month of inflation above 5 percent. In November, CPI was up 6.9 percent.
What’s known as core CPI–which excludes the often-volatile categories of food and energy–increased 5.5 percent in December from a year earlier, a faster pace of price hikes than November’s 4.9 percent.
Compared with a month earlier, prices rose 0.5 percent. Core prices were up 0.6 percent.
Analysts had forecast year-over-year inflation at 7.1 percent, with core inflation at 5.4 percent. On a monthly basis, analysts were expecting prices to move up 0.4 percent and core prices to rise 0.5 percent.
No comments:
Post a Comment