Sunday, November 19, 2017

Deciphering taxes

Blare over tax reform is assaulting the eyes and ears of Americans.  Hyperpartisanship is at peak pitch. Below is a sample.



Trump cannot stand being viewed as a failure for 10 months on the legislative front, and he is crazed for a win on taxes to prove he can "get things done." The Republicans think they are doomed in the 2018 elections if they don't get tax cuts passed. Trump and the Republicans have huge political self-interest to pull out all the stops in selling to the country that it absolutely needs their tax cut plan to stimulate the economy, boost wages and create millions of jobs.

The Democrats have equal political self-interest in their heart in not wanting Trump to get a legislative win that will prop him up, and in wanting to take back the House in 2018. The Democrats are hot on the case that Trump and the Republicans are seeking an outrageous giveaway to business and the rich that has very little promise for the rest of the country.

Americans may find it impossible  to decide who and what to believe about taxes.

Their problem is aggravated by little trust in Congress and the President.

In trying to decide who and what to believe about the idea of huge tax cuts for the rich being  necessary and effective to get jobs and boost wages for the rest of the people, voters might start by thinking about the 2008 financial crisis.

The 2008 financial crisis and the 2017 tax cut 
In the 2008 financial crisis, Wall Street had the rest of the country over the barrel on the basis that, if Wall Street was not bailed out, the nation's financial system would collapse.

The country was told it had no choice, and Wall Street was bailed out.

After the bail out, the fortunes of Wall Street and the super-wealthy recovered and zoomed spectacularly.

Much of the rest of the country, however, went into a long, tough struggle trying to get back to where they were before the financial crisis.

Now, in 2017, Trump and the Republicans are telling the country that, to finish the job of recovery from the financial crisis and get on a robust upward trajectory for all, it is imperative for there to be a very large corporate tax cut, in order to stimulate economic growth, and provide great wage growth and millions of jobs to benefit those who have lagged behind. If the tax cuts are not passed, those who have lagged since the financial crisis will continue to lag, say Trump and the Republicans.

Having seen what happened in the financial crisis, and who came out ok and who did not, there may be reason to cast a jaundiced eye on what is being put out to Americans by Trump and the Republicans concerning their tax cut plan.

Consider some things about 2008 and 2017.

2008 was frighteningly dire for the country, financial collapse was imminent, and there was not room  for destructive, self-interested hyperpartisanship. The direness for all in 2008 summoned up a trusting and belief by the American people that their leaders were doing the right and necessary thing in bailing out Wall Street to save the financial system.

In 2017, the country is not in dire straits, a cataclysm is not overhanging the country, self interested hypartisanship is raging, there is much distrust of Congress and the President, and all that gives room for skepticism about what Trump and the Republicans are telling the country.

Both 2008 and 2017 give rise to asking one's self: How much do Wall Street and the super rich genuinely care about what happens to the rest of the country? To what extent will they act on a first priority of taking care of themselves, regardless of what happens to the rest. In the case of 2017, how strongly do Wall Street and the super rich believe that wages will be increased and millions of jobs created for the rest of the country, or are they just saying that in service of getting huge tax cut benefits for themselves?

In appraising this, it is unfortunately needed to work through  the debate going on about the tax cut plan of Trump and the Republicans.

Central questions
The central questions raised by the tax cuts proposed by Trump and the Republicans are these:

1. Who is going to get what amounts of the tax cuts, and what is "fair" distribution of the tax cuts in a situation of those who pay the most taxes getting a disproportionate share of the tax cuts; 

2. How much increased economic growth will result from the tax cuts, and how much benefit from the increased growth will accrue to labor (in the form of higher wages and new job creation) and how much will accrue to capital (in the form of higher after tax earnings paid out as dividends and higher stock prices); and

3. How much additional tax revenues will result from the increased economic growth that will offset the greater deficits and higher national debt that would occur if the tax cuts did not result in increased economic growth.

Who gets what tax cuts
The rough general information is that there will be a net of $1-1/2 trillion in tax cuts, businesses will receive about $1 trillion of the tax cuts, and individuals will receive about $500 billion. (See Business Insider),

Much information will be put out about the amounts of tax cuts that persons in various categories and circumstances will receive under the tax cut plan.

Proponents of the tax bill are putting out that an average family of four will receive about $1200 in tax cuts.

Amounts of corporate tax cuts need to be traced through to ultimate recipients and beneficiaries of the saved taxes. The corporate tax cuts can be used by corporations to pay dividends to stockholders, or to pay higher wages to existing employees, or to expand the business, and in the latter case, beyond the amounts of the tax cuts, there are additional wages that may get paid to new employees and increased corporate earnings that may be paid to stockholders.

How much "labor" will get from the corporate tax cuts and how much "capital" will get from the corporate tax cuts will be affected by a number of possible factors, and this probably makes for a great deal of uncertainty about predictions. These enter into the debate about how the above $1200 average family tax cut gets raised by average amounts of wage growth (discussed more in the next section).

Increased economic growth
Trump and the Republicans cannot sell their tax cuts plan merely on the basis of the average family getting $1200, and Trump and the Republicans have to make the case that huge tax cuts for corporations and the rich are needed and will result in greatly increased economic growth and great wage increases and job creation for those who have been lagging in the recovery.

The Democrats will say endeavor mightily to cast doubt on what Trump and the Republicans say.

Each side will have their economists weigh in, and the economists on the two sides are expressing very differing views.

Try as hard as you want, I think you will only find imponderable disagreement among economists and other experts about how much increased economic growth will result from the tax cut plan, and how much benefit from the increased growth will accrue to labor (in the form of higher wages and new job creation) and how much will accrue to "capital" (as in the form of higher dividends and higher stock prices).

If you wish to wade into the disagreements, you can start by reading: (i) White House economist and former Treasury Secretary spar over Trump tax plan; (ii) Lawrence Summers' Hatchet Jobs On Tax Reform And Kevin Hassett;  (iii) Prepared Remarks By Council of Economic Advisors Kevin Hassett Before the Tax Policy-Center Foundation (the "Remarks"); (iv) The Trump administration’s tax plan is an atrocity "Remarks"): and (v) Lawrence Summers: One last time on who benefits from corporate tax cuts.

You should also consider how it will take time to gain a good sense of who was right and who was wrong, and even then there are likely to be other factors and causes that bear on the economic situation of the country down the way so that it will be very hard to tell exactly what effect the tax cut plan of Trump and the Republicans have had (assuming it is enacted).

For something to talk about, let's refer to the $1000 to $4000 range for average family increase in wages that Summers and Hassett lay out.

There are about 125,000,000 household in the country. Multiplying that by the $4000 high range of Hassett yields $500 billion to "labor", and $125 billion to "labor" if the Summers $1000 number is used..

While you may think the tax cut plan presents very significant uncertainty about what the outcome a couple of years down the line, there may be great propensity for you to say, "well, I'm going to get some tax cut, the country has to try something with taxes to increase economic growth, there should be some positive effect in jobs and wages, and maybe it will turn out pretty well."

Trump and the Republicans certainly want you to react that way.

The Democrats will try to get you to react differently.

The political stakes for Trump and the Republicans and for the Democrats are enormous.

Economic inequality
At bottom, the country may be in a terrible box regarding the tax cuts plan.

This box  comes from economic inequality that has grown during the past thirty years and that has gotten very extreme during the past ten.

This increased economic inequality distorts even further the disproportionate share of the benefit of the tax cuts going to Wall Street and the super rich, and creates an even greater risk if the tax cuts don't do as Trump and the Republicans promised, and such will even further exacerbate the problem of economic inequality.

Let's explore this

A. Economic inequality since financial crisis

Consider the below that Trump's economist Hassett says in the Remarks:
Over the course of the Obama administration, U.S. corporate profits rose by a healthy 11 percent per year. But workers’ pay didn’t keep pace, and median wage growth was a paltry 0.6 percent per year. This disconnect between profits and wages is a radical departure from previous economic norms. Workers used to get a 1.1 percent raise for a 1 percent increase in corporate profits. Now the passthrough to workers is closer to 0.4 percent. Why did it change so much? Because the profits are offshore, benefiting other nations’ workers. In 2016, U.S. firms kept 71 percent of foreign-earned profits abroad. What would happen if they didn't do that? A simple back-of-the envelope calculation suggests U.S. workers in 2016 would have received a raise of nearly 1 percent. What if these firms didn't do that for the next 8 years? The median U.S. household would get a $4,000 real income raise.

What Hassett says above corresponds with the sense in the country that Wall Street and the super rich fared spectacularly well in coming back from the financial crisis and the rest of the country has been left behind for a decade.

As Hassett states above, "[o]ver the course of the Obama administration, U.S. corporate profits rose by a healthy 11 percent per year."

Up to the election of Trump, the stock market valuation more than doubled since the financial crisis, and that correlates with the very worsening picture about economic inequality.

But Hassett says there is a "disconnect between profits and wages [that] is a radical departure from previous economic norms.'

At this juncture of the "once in a generation opportunity"  regarding tax reform,  it would seem extremely important that the country get it right in diagnosing the reason for the "radical departure from previous economic norms". If that is diagnosed incorrectly, and  the "radical departure" may continue and lead to even greater economic inequality and result in more lagging by those who have lagged since the financial crisis.

B. Increased economic inequality from the tax cuts

Since Trump's election the stock market valuation has increased possibly by as much as $5 trillion. (Fortune magazine puts the increase at $3.8 trillion for the S&P 500. http://fortune.com/2017/11/08/donald-trump-record-stock-market-election/ .)

Stock market valuations are based on earnings, expectations about future earnings and about future growth that will contribute to future earnings, and other financial factors that affect the valuation of profitability.

Wages, increased wages, and wages that are paid to new employees if there is job growth, are dollars that go to labor and not to capital. Expectations about increased wages or wages to be paid to new hires are not something that will cause stock prices to rise. If the stock market valuation goes up, it is not measuring the increased amounts going to labor but only increased profits that happen along with the increased amounts going to labor.

As regards tax cuts, besides academic economists such as Hassett and Summers, also investors and their economists try to predict how corporations will use their tax cuts for paying higher dividends, paying higher wages, or expanding their business, and they try to  predict how much corporations will expand their business, and how much the expanded business will yield earning that can go to the stockholders after their projections of how much will go to increased wages or wages for new employees.

In the investment universe, investors don't have to wait to see how things turn out before money can be put in their pockets. Unlike the rest of the country that has to wait to see whether they will have  wage growth and new jobs actually created, investors, based on their expectations, can proceed to bid up stock prices. This provides immediate realization of amounts investors will get of the corporate tax cuts. The full amount of what investors will get from the reduced corporate taxes  may not get immediately reflected in stock prices, and stock prices can continue to rise over time as it becomes more certain what amounts investors will receive from the tax cuts.

The $4 trillion or so run up in the stock market since election day may be attributable to a number of causes including (i) Trump's loosening of regulations contributing to expectations business will be able to be more profitable, (ii) expectations that corporate taxes will be reduced and part of the tax cuts will be payable as dividends, and (iii) expectations of increased economic growth attributable to tax cuts, and such growth further increasing corporate earnings payable as dividends.

No one can say for sure how much of the $4 trillion or so run up in the stock market since election day is attributable to  expectations of tax cuts and how much "capital" will receive from the tax cuts.

Regardless, since election day, the amount by which economic inequality has been increased by the $4 trillion or run up in the stock market might be fairly put at that $4 trillion or so.

Further no one can say how much further run up there will be if the tax cuts arepassed (or how much the stock market will fall if, for some reason, it appears that there will not be corporate tax cuts), and how much more will go to "capital" and further increase economic ineqaulity

With nothing being provable anytime soon, Trump and the Republicans will be absolutely adamant that the promised benefits will happen, and the Democrats, can be equally adamant that there will be a huge giveaway to Wall Street and the super rich which the rest of the country will get little, and the country will be saddled with bigger deficits and bigger national debt.

Deficits and the national debt
It should also be kept in mind how the risks about deficits and national debt will be played down by Trump and the Republicans by reason of their short term political desperation to get a legislative win on taxes.

Trump seems to care little about deficits and the national debt and will most likely say little or nothing about that in trying to sell his tax plan. The Republicans will exhibit more ostensible concern and will talk about the certainty of increased economic growth resulting from the tax cuts and how increased tax revenues from that will offset increased deficits and national debt that would occur if there was not increased economic growth.

Who cashes in now; who's at risk?
As discussed above, Wall Street and the super rich are all set to "cash in" on the tax cuts. There has already been a spectacular run up in the stock market, in part attributable to the expectation of tax cuts. There may be more of a run up if the tax cuts are enacted.

The rest of the country is at risk about how much wage boost and how much job creation will come about.

Throw on top of that the risk to the rest of the country of increased deficits and national debt if increased economic growth does not take place as projected.

Listen to what is being said about donors driving the Republicans to act. That's another sign of Wall Street and the super rich seeking to cash in for themselves with little good for the rest of the country.

It should be noted how Trump himself will cash in on his tax cut plan.  Trump has made clear he is exempt from conflicts of interest and he has a right to profit from his presidency. Eliminating the estate tax is a whopper of Trump's using the Presidency to benefit himself and his family.

What are the other choices?
2017 is not dire the way 2008 was. Things are going positively for the economy. It is not imperative that something be done in 2017 about taxes the way it was imperative to do something in 2008 about the financial crisis.

The short term self-interested political desperation of Trump and the Republicans are an immense driver for "cut taxes now" and should be allowed to take precipitous action on taxes.

A good argument can be made that Wall Street and the super rich have already cashed in and may cash in much more on the corporate tax cuts, and that it would be fair for a time to increase the individual tax rates of the rich to balance off the immense benefit to their wealth they have received and will receive from the corporate tax cuts (which they say are imperative to increase economic growth, boost wages, and create jobs for the rest of the country).

A different approach that would give more bona fides to the "good" intentions of Wall Street and the super rich would be doing tax cuts in the form of tax credits to corporations if there are increased payrolls (from wage boosts and new jobs). In other words, instead of guaranteeing their cash in to Wall Street and the super rich, the proposition to them would be, "Ok you say tax cuts will boost wages and create jobs. Show us. Here are tax cuts you will get if you proceed with expand business activities that increase your payroll." This could be extended to tax credits of education programs undertaken by corporations to educate and train workers with skills that can contribute to greater productivity, wage growth and job creation.

Basing the tax cuts on increased payroll makes more certain benefits to labor and shifts risk and onus to capital that capital may get increased returns from the tax cuts but it is required that labor is benefited.

Instead of being hell bent on saving their political skins, Trump and the Republicans could use some serious soul searching about the increasing economic inequality, and factors that may impair achieving what they say the tax cuts will achieve. An example is automation and robotics that may be increasing the return to capital and decreasing the return to labor from economic activity, and what can done to compensate for that in the society. Another example is the extent to which that there are already jobs that are not getting filled because of a lack of qualified workers and how to meet economy's need for worker training.

Instead of acting out there short term political desperation, Trump and the Republicans are probably in need of soul searching about health care reform, which is likely far more critical for the country than saving their political skins with "must cut taxes now."

Deciphering taxes
The deciphering of taxes I come up with is that I do not trust Trump and the Republicans, and I believe their tax cuts plan should not be passed by Congress. 

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