Trump: Promises Kept / Promises Broken: on Tax Reform

Donald Trump: 1991: Reagan tax cut a catastrophe; 2017: Reagan led economy

Trump has long attacked the 1986 Tax Reform Act as a disaster. The Act eliminated tax advantages for real estate, and Trump naturally equated the loss of special treatment for his own industry with harm for the economy as a whole. "This tax act was just an absolute catastrophe for the country," he told Congress in 1991. Eight years later, still fuming that Senator Bill Bradley (D-NJ)--a co-sponsor of the law--was running for president, Trump called it "one of the worst ideas in recent history."

Donald Trump: OpEd: 1986 tax reform was revenue-neutral; 2017 reform isn't

One might wonder why Trump reversed himself. The answer is, he really hasn't. Republicans have used the aura of the 1986 Tax Reform Act to promote their tax-cut plans. But what they have in mind now is quite different. The 1986 Tax Reform Act was a bipartisan law, which did not reduce revenue to the government, and actually increased the effective tax rate paid by the rich by eliminating special treatment for capital gains and other tax breaks for the rich. Some Democrats have offered to support legislation along those lines, but the Republican leadership has outright refused.

It's not clear whether Trump realizes the law he praised at length [this week] is the same one he previously accused of destroying the American economy.

Republican Party: OpEd: 1986 tax reform was bipartisan; 2017 reform isn't

One might wonder why Trump reversed himself. The answer is, he really hasn't. Republicans have used the aura of the 1986 Tax Reform Act to promote their tax-cut plans. But what they have in mind now is quite different. The 1986 Tax Reform Act was a bipartisan law, which did not reduce revenue to the government, and actually increased the effective tax rate paid by the rich by eliminating special treatment for capital gains and other tax breaks for the rich. Some Democrats have offered to support legislation along those lines, but the Republican leadership has outright refused.

It's not clear whether Trump realizes the law he praised at length [this week] is the same one he previously accused of destroying the American economy.