CTJ: "Gang of Six" Plan would reduce revenue and encourage corporate tax dodging (PLEASE READ) [View All]

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http://ctj.org/ctjreports/2011/07/gang_of_six_plan_would_reduce_revenue_and_encourage_corporate_tax_dodging.php

The plan released yesterday by the “Gang of Six” U.S. Senators to reduce the budget deficit includes revenue measures that would actually
increase the deficit. The document says that the“tax reform” provisions in the plan would reduce revenue by $1.5 trillion by 2021 compared to the Congressional Budget Office’s current law baseline. This means the plan would reduce taxes compared to what would happen under current law if Congress simply does nothing.

Senators Hope that Manipulation of Baselines Will Be Too Arcane for Media or Public to Understand

How can these Senators justify including tax cuts in a plan that has the ostensible purpose of reducing the deficit? They use a common, if deceptive, accounting gimmick. They not only compare their plan to “current law” but also to an alternative baseline that assumes that the Bush income tax cuts have been made permanent for incomes below $250,000 for married couples and below $200,000 for unmarried taxpayers, and also assumes that the Bush estate tax cut has partially been made permanent. In other words, they compare their plan to what would happen if Congress makes permanent 81 percent of the Bush tax cuts, which are scheduled to expire at the end of 2012 under current law. Compared to this assumption that Congress will enact a permanent Bush tax cut extension that Congress has never enacted, the tax reform envisioned in the Gang of Six plan would raise an asserted $1 trillion over a decade.“Whatever you think about tax cuts, we should all agree that they are not part of deficit reduction,” said Robert S. McIntyre, director of Citizens for Tax Justice. “Comparing a plan with tax cuts to even larger tax cuts that Congress has never enacted does not magically make the plan a revenue generator."

The plan would exempt profits shifted to corporate tax havens.

http://www.ctj.org/pdf/gangofsix.pdf
The "Gang of Six" plan would actually increase the deficit.