I haven’t looked into it in any detail, but I DID see somethings claiming that down the line, the tax will result in tax INCREASES on folk earning <$50k. Good lord!
I truly am astounded that there aren’t more Repubs in either house who have more respect for themselves, their offices, and their constituents to stand up against this atrocity. Realize that it isn’t as though the majority of Reps/Sens are young whippersnappers struggling to support their young families on their paychecks. These old, wealthy folk are truly despicable.
I agree this is a big temporary win for Trump, and it took shrewd judgement to pass this. More shrewdness went into passing it by threatening Congressfolk (who should understand its contents) then into writing a more moderate bill which will appeal to future voters.
Comedian Dimitri Martin makes fun of the superficial emphasis some place on ab muscles, saying what they mainly show is one can “poop real good”. I pass things everyday. They may not require party whips and repeated caucuses, but they smell the same and have similar longterm effects.
Many of those young whippersnappers struggling to support their young families on their paychecks support tax cuts for the rich because one day they too might become rich.
See: The Joe the Plumber Fallacy
That which is done by presidential fiat is very easily undone by presidential fiat, however. Mr Trump has dramatically raised tariffs: the average rate on goods imported into America is currently 15.6%, or more than six times the level before he became president in January. But he has raised them unilaterally, through an expansive reading of his emergency powers which is currently being contested in court. When Elon Musk was still within the president’s orbit, he was dispatched to run amok through the federal government. But many of the firings and other cuts he ordained have been reversed by court order. These are not durable ways to implement economic policy. Americans still speak of the Reagan revolution, Bill Clinton’s welfare reform and Obamacare. What programme will they remember Mr Trump by?
They may simply remember his profligacy. Wonks are still crunching the numbers on the version of the bbbpassed by the Senate, but preliminary estimates suggest it would add some $4.5trn to American debt over the coming decade. The cbo expects America to run an average annual fiscal deficit of 5.8% of gdp over the coming decade; the bbb would increase that by a further 1.25 percentage points. America would end up with public debt of more than 120% of gdp (see chart 2).
The White House has devised a fiscal fantasyland to dispense with such tiresome facts, in which the bbb initiates such breakneck growth that revenues soar and debt plummets. The Council of Economic Advisers (cea) put out a report that predicts that the bbb will add more than a percentage point to annual gdp growth and that there would be “$8.5trn to $11.1trn in total offsetting deficit reduction from Trump economic policies anchored by the bbb”. Heroically, the council predicts that, by the end of this halcyon era, the national debt will have fallen to 94%.
This is, sadly, preposterous. The bbb is largely a continuation of existing policy, so extending it will not generate a new wave of growth. Some provisions encourage investment: businesses are able to deduct research and development costs from their tax bills in full and depreciate their assets more rapidly. Independent modellers, however, think this would spur a fraction of the growth the White House is promising. The cea gets its maths to work by assuming not only that Mr Trump will manage to unleash America’s animal spirits through deregulation, but also that he will convince Congress to slash spending (the opposite of what it has been doing this week) and that his tariffs will raise trillions for the Treasury.
It is a big, beautiful fairy tale. A good indication of how much credence Republicans lend these rosy forecasts is the Senate’s decision to include a clause in the bbb to raise the cap on the federal government’s debt by $5trn. A fiscal reckoning is inevitable, and not that far off. The trust funds that make Social Security and Medicare payments are expected to run out of money in 2032, which would force either cuts to benefits or a hefty new burden on budgets. It will be a daunting fiscal hurdle for Mr Trump’s successor.
If you’re talking about being passed in the Senate, then you could try to make that argument, but I think this was more about most Republicans in Congress being Trump toadies than any kind of shrewness on the part of Trump or any of his unqualified goons. And don’t forget that it’s back in the House and still has to pass there.
The question of why there isn’t broader public opposition to this has come up. One other thing mentioned on Oliver’s show is that the majority of Americans have little or no idea what this bill is about, and many have never even heard of it.
I was also wondering why this hadn’t been discussed on the Dope. We’ve seen plenty about ICE deportations, and the protests against those, as well as over various social issues, but AIUI, this bill is going to hurt an awful lot more people.
Is it possible Democratic politicians want it to pass, since unlike many of Trump’s other policies, it will cause general pain and hurt re-election chances for Republicans? That would explain why there isn’t more of a fuss about it, but it seems like a very risky strategy.
Yep. If it was the other way around, and Dems were trying to pass a bill that Republicans hated, the right-wing spin machine would be in high gear and working overtime.
What I meant was that the majority of Reps/Sens are reasonably (if not very) old and reasonably (if not extremely) wealthy - with generous pensions. It isn’t as tho these fuckers HAVE to keep their jobs to put food on their tables, or even to leave decent chunk of change to their heirs. There is no personal exigency excuse for them supporting this. They could easily walk away. Either they are drunk on power, or they truly want to be horrible to people, the environment, and future generations.
I truly cannot understand that degree of venality.
A few people I follow on TwitteX have been complaining about it, but it doesn’t seem to have got much traction there either, compared to other issues. Although it’s hard to get a balanced view since the exodus to Bl**sky.
I absolutely am, though I also think that GOP senators and representatives also worry about not only keeping their jobs (and power) in Congress, but worry about whether they would have any sort of success in the private sector if they have become outcast.
With what happened in Minnesota a couple of weeks ago, and to Nancy Pelosi’s husband a couple of years ago, it’s clear that a climate has been fostered which makes unstable people (RWNJs in particular) not only feel empowered to take things into their own hands, but feel called to do so by their leaders. I also think that it’s not entirely unwarranted, at this point, to worry about winding up on a “political enemies list,” and finding oneself imprisoned.
While the bill is an appalling bucket of santorum™️, I wasn’t aware of any federal funding for abortion, so I’m not sure how it could be reduced.
I’m aware that Planned Parenthood previously received some nominal amount of funding, but was specifically required that none of it went to abortion services.
My understanding is that, yes, this is true, but this bill yanks most, if not all, remaining Federal funding from Planned Parenthood – about $700 million a year; that is apparently about 1/3 of their total operating budget, so it’s more than “nominal.”
