The voices of Tax Policy Center's researchers and staff
Last week, I blogged on the many GOP presidential candidates who are talking about tax reform rather than tax cuts. This week, tax historian Joe Thorndike published a rebuttal on the Tax Analysts blog and on Forbes.com.
Joe, who is very much in the watch-what-they-do-not what-they-say (WWTDNWTS) camp, noted that while few GOP presidential hopefuls are talking about tax cuts, many of their proposals are, in fact tax cuts. Big ones, in fact.
Joe is absolutely right. Indeed, I noted in my post that, based on what the candidates have told us so far, some of these reforms would add trillions of dollars to the debt. Yet these presidential hopefuls are hardly channeling their inner Ronald Reagan (circa 1980 at least) and promoting big tax cuts. And, indeed, some of them—including Florida Senator Marco Rubio and New Jersey Governor Chris Christie--explicitly promise fairness and economic growth but not tax reductions.
Like Joe, I am usually a firm believer in WWTDNWTS. And it may very well be that these pols really do favor ginormous tax cuts. But they are not saying so, at least not yet. And that is interesting.
Reread mine. Read Joe’s. Let us know what you think.
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