Democrats are considering peeling a cap on salt tax deductions, which would basically
be another massive tax giveaway to the wealthiest Americans. Now the salt tax, for those of
you who are not familiar, salt stands for state and local taxes. So when you say salt
tax, it's actually a redundant use of the word tax, but either way, it allows individuals
to write off state and local taxes that they pay on their federal taxes. And as part of
the 2017 Republican tax scam, they actually, and this is a good thing. They kept salt deductions
at $10,000. So whether you made 20,000 a year or 20 million a year, you couldn't write off
more than $10,000 in salt taxes. And that actually he hurt the wealthy elite a little
bit because in the past they would typically write off, you know, maybe a hundred thousand,
maybe 200,000 more, but average working class people typically don't have much salt tax
to pay.
So they never even hit that $10,000 a year threshold. So they benefited the most from
this cap. The wealthy had to pay a little more. Well, Democrats are now let's get rid
of the cap result in the benefits of getting rid of that cap. 62% of the benefits would
go to the top 1% and a 86% of the benefits would go to the top 5%, 86% of the benefits
of repealing that salt cap would go to the top 5% income earners here in the United States.
Bernie Sanders did an interview recently with Axios where he said that quote, this would
be a terrible, terrible message to send to the American public right now. And he's of
course, absolutely right, because what's happening in this country right now, what's happening
is that you've had this massive shift in the way. People think about taxes, look at all
of the recent polling data. Even Republicans now agree with the statement, the wealthy
do not pay their fair share in taxes. And they including Republicans, obviously independents
and Democrats were already there, but even Republicans say, I want them to pay more.
I want corporations to pay more in taxes across the board. A majority of Americans say, make
them pay more. The Democrats have the wind at their backs, the public on their side.
And instead of doing anything meaningful, they say, Ooh, what if we did a Republican
thing and cut their taxes?
I don't know. I don't know. I even know what to say anymore, because that is such an idiotic
idea. When you've got the public out there telling you don't do this, Bernie Sanders
has given you this warning. Of course, he goes largely ignored with his warnings. That
all turn out to be true. And Democrats are still saying, I don't know, man. We could
get rid of it and benefit just the top 5% of income earners here in the United States.
There's no reason to do this. It would cost the economy $90 billion a year in lost tax
revenue. Leave it in place, move on. And why do you even have to mention it in the first
place? Is there a political realignment happening where you have people like Ted Cruz going
out, trashing corporations and Democrats saying they want to cut their taxes? Like what in
the hell is going on in this country right now? Of course we know why Ted Cruz is doing
that. He's not genuine about it, but Democrats know cutting taxes for the wealthy. That's
not your thing. You leave that to Republicans and you let the public be at them for it.
Bernie's right. This would send a terrible, terrible message to millions of struggling
Americans. Still trying to find their way through this pandemic. The wealthy don't need
any more coddling. What they need are higher tax brackets.