Tax Day Protests, Tax Plan Progress

Published April 18, 2017 at 9:00 AM CDT

Protesters march past the Trump International Hotel, backround left, and the Internal Revenue Services building, right, during a Tax Day demonstration in Washington, Saturday, April 15, 2017, calling on President Donald Trump to release his tax returns. (Manuel Balce Ceneta/AP)

On Tax Day, we’ll look at what a Trump tax overhaul could look like for the country and for you.

It is Tax Day. If you haven’t filed, you’d better. Time is short. Americans are pretty good about paying their taxes. And Americans wonder plenty whether their tax system couldn’t be better. Fairer. Cleaner. More efficient. Less abused. Donald Trump said on the campaign trail he knew tax law better than anyone, and was the only one who could fix it. The country’s still waiting. Waiting too for Trump’s own returns. This hour On Point, American taxes, tax overhaul, and President Trump’s returns. — Tom Ashbrook

Guests

Sahil Kapur, national political reporter for Bloomberg Politics. ( @sahilkapur)

David Cay Johnston, founder of DCReport.org. Author of “The Making of Donald Trump.” ( @DavidCayJ)

Len Burman, co-founder of the Tax Policy Center, a joint project of the Urban Institute and the Brookings Institution. Professor of public administration and internal affairs at the Maxwell School of Syracuse University. Former Deputy Assistant Secretary for Tax Analysis at the U.S. Treasury Department. ( @lenburman)

Kyle Pomerleau, director of federal projects at the Tax Foundation. ( @kpomerleau)

From Tom’s Reading List

DCReport: Trump’s Bosses Demand His Financial Information — “Tens of thousands of protestors at demonstrations nationwide Saturday called for Trump to release his taxes. Crowds gathered in Washington, New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, San Francisco and elsewhere. Trump has refused to release his taxes. He is now claiming that the demonstrators were paid.”

Bloomberg Politics: Trump’s Tax Overhaul Keeps Congress Waiting as Questions Pile Up — “The administration hasn’t yet publicly answered the most basic questions about what a possible tax reform plan would look like. Will it pay for itself with offsets or add to the deficit? Trump hasn’t said. White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer has emphasized that job creation and economic growth are priorities — an indication that controlling costs may not be Trump’s primary concern. That could render any tax cuts temporary, meaning they’d expire after 10 years under Senate budget rules.”

Tax Foundation: Federal Tax Reform: The Impact on States — “Federal tax reform, however, does not just impact the federal government and its revenue collections; state revenues are also affected by tax reform. States largely use the federal Internal Revenue Code as the basis of their state taxes. Changes to definitions of income, through base broadening, would flow downward to state-level taxes, impacting state revenues. In general, states should expect to see an increase in revenue from federal tax reform efforts, but in the few cases where revenue changes could result in lower revenues, state policymakers have a number of policy options available to them to ease the transition to a new tax structure.”