Daily Deduction Budget Battles Continue
Renu Zaretsky
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The House Budget Committee released a spending plan for 2017. The panel will mark it up today. The budget would cut $7 trillion from the federal deficit over the next decade and maintain spending ceilings set in last year’s budget deal that then-speaker John Boehner cut with the White House. The committee’s plan would also repeal the Affordable Care Act, reduce the size of the Department of Commerce, cut funding from the Environmental Protection Agency, create a pay-in structure for Medicare, and give states control over the food stamps program. Conservative GOP members remain unimpressed. Meanwhile, the Congressional Budget Office said that the budget’s sharp cut in federal spending would cause a drop in economic output.

Pennsylvania still has no budget. Democratic Governor Tom Wolf had no kind words for the Republican budget released yesterday. Wolf says the GOP lawmakers’ plan would run up a $1.6 billion deficit next year. With no tax increase in the plan, state aid to public schools could suffer a $1 billion cut.

House Ways & Means Chairman Kevin Brady wants tax community feedback. Speaking at a Tax Executives Institute conference, he urged the tax community to offer input on specific international tax reform proposals and how they’d affect economic growth. Brady said that policy consensus will drive the timeline of an international tax reform draft, Tax Analysts reports.

Just in time for St. Patrick’s Day? Northern Ireland officials visiting the US are promoting the reduced corporate tax rate that’s to take effect in 2018. Companies in Northern Ireland will pay a 12.5 percent tax on profits, versus 19 percent for those elsewhere in the United Kingdom.  

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