Daily Deduction Congress, on Retreat with a Small Step toward Tax Reform
Renu Zaretsky
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The Daily Deduction will return Tuesday, after the Martin Luther King, Jr., holiday. The Senate Finance Committee has created five new working groups for tax reform. The bipartisan groups will address provisions of the tax code that relate to individuals, businesses, savings and investment, international issues, and community development and infrastructure. Each must complete its work by the end of May. Committee chairman Orrin Hatch and the panel’s top Democrat, Ron Wyden, hope the task forces can lay the foundation for a consensus reform bill. TPC’s Howard Gleckman thinks it is a good start but warns the process has its own pitfalls. One business group has identified its pro-growth tax reform strategy. The National Association of Manufacturers commissioned a study that finds that over a decade, the US could increase economic growth by $12 trillion, boost investment by $3.3 trillion, and add 6.5 million jobs. All Congress needs to do is cut the corporate tax rate to 25 percent, shift global taxation to a territorial system, allow full expensing of all capital equipment purchases, adopt a permanent 20 percent research and development credit, and allow pass-through businesses all those same benefits. How would NAM pay for it all?  The group concludes “there is no need to impose [revenue neutrality] on every individual component of a comprehensive tax reform package.” As Russell Long used to say, they’d “tax the fella behind the tree.” Will Amazon’s Luxembourg tax bill need to grow, too? Today the European Union is expected to share details of its investigation of Amazon’s tax arrangements in Luxembourg. The investigation seeks to answer whether Luxembourg broke EU state aid rules in allowing Amazon to operate almost tax-free in Europe. Tax filing season begins today. The IRS Free File program opened today for taxpayers, and the IRS will begin accepting and processing all tax returns on Tuesday, Jan. 20. Interested in subscribing to The Daily Deduction, the Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center summary of the day’s tax news? Sign-up here for free access. If you’d like to tell us about a new research paper or have any comments about our new feature, write us at [email protected].