IRS: Average Tax Refund Down 8.4 Percent Under Trump Tax Scam
Credit: Saul Loeb/Getty
February 9, 2019

In the first week of 2019's filing season, the IRS reports that the average tax refund has dropped 8.4% under Trump's cuts.

This is early in the season, but it's a trend that must make the Trump administration shiver.

Many economists viewed the hurried nature of the Trump administration trying to get their tax cut plan passed so quickly as a key component of their fears. Republicans didn't have enough time to properly vet what they were proposing. There was virtually no time spent with experts and holding hearings to properly assess the damage the proposed tax changes would cause to normal American households.

Rep. Peter King, a staunch Trump supporter, voted against the tax bill because the 10K SALT CAP was put in place.

Politicians from both sides of the aisle looked at this tax plan as an attack on the coastal states that didn't vote for Trump.

The Nation's Sasha Abramsky writes:

Here are three ways the bill hits residents of California, New York, New Jersey, and a handful of other states—all of which are already “donor states,” meaning that their taxpayers send more money to Washington than they get back in federal spending—peculiarly hard: First, in capping the amount of state, local, and property taxes that taxpayers can deduct from their federal income calculations, the bill ensures that middle-income earners in these states will be double-taxed when they pay federal taxes. Approximately 3 million Californians, experts calculate, already pay more than $10,000 a year in state taxes.

Second, in limiting the homeowner mortgage-interest deduction, the bill deliberately targets the middle classes of states like California, where property costs far more than any other state except Hawaii. While progressives have long urged reform of this part of the tax code, their hope was that in eliminating a boon to homeowners, money would be liberated for social spending on affordable housing, health-care expansion, debt-free higher education, and other social goods that would benefit the whole community, including the taxpayers being asked to foot higher bills. Instead, homeowners in Los Angeles, San Francisco, New York, Boston, and other high-cost cities will now be subsidizing billionaires’ tax breaks and a rollback of the estate tax for America’s wealthiest families.

Third, the bill entirely eliminates the personal exemption—a little more than $4,000 per family member—that a family can take off of their taxable income.

It's a really good piece and should be read in its entirety.

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