Tax reform has been all over the news as of late. There have been lots of discussions and media stories regarding the proposed tax reform and the progress it has made. However, there are concerns over the timeline for a lot of people. Many people are wondering when it will be completed and when it will be officially put into motion. This tax reform will completely change the way that taxes are managed in our country and it will impact essentially every American.
So when will it be completed? While there is still no official timeline, there are people looking to make the push for the end of this year. One of those people is Gary Cohn, the individual who is currently serving as the chief economic adviser for President Trump. He recently told The Wall Street Journal that the tax reform package must happen during this calendar year. He told the CEO Council of The Wall Street Journal about this just last week.
Gary Cohn said on the matter, “Look, I think it’s really important to get it done. We’ve got to get taxes done this year. The legislative calendar is going to get very crowded come the first and second week of December.”
Gary Cohn is not the only one who wants to push for this to be completed by the end of the year. President Donald Trump has also recently expressed his goal of getting a bill regarding the tax reform signed by Christmas. At first he was hoping it would be completed by Thanksgiving but that clearly didn’t happen.
Trump is also thinking that the bill will appeal to Democrats. He followed this up by stating, “In fact, I think we’ll have some Democrats doing this and voting for us for the reduced taxes because it’s a tax bill for middle class; it’s a tax bill for jobs, it’s going to bring a lot of companies in; and it’s a tax bill for business, which is going to create the jobs.”
Gary Cohn backed this up in his statement last week by defending both the House and the Senate tax bills. He emphasized that they would both reduce the tax burdens for middle-class families. Another reason why he thinks that there should be no cause for concern regarding any lawmaker hesitancy to back any plan that is put forward because there are provisions in place for the proposed bills that are designed to eliminate or reduce the federal deductions for both state and local taxes.
Cohn said, “The only way to grade whether it’s successful or not is to literally look at the tables, look at the distributions and say, does this do what we want it do and does it deliver tax relief to hardworking American families? And the answer to both bills is, yes it does.”
Cohn is very confident in the bill and not only is hoping for it to be signed by both the House, which has now happened, and the Senate before the end of the year, he thinks that it is possible. However, there are a few things that have been slowing the passing of the bills so far. Some of these issues include various disagreements over the state and local tax deductions, some potential changes to current 401(k) retirement plans, and other areas of concern.
As of late last week, the House passed the bill with 227 Republican votes. While this is a big step, it does still need to be passed by the Senate. The Senate has been working on developing a different form of the bill which may cause some issues down the road for the process. However, as of now, the Senate Panel has passed the alternate version of the bill. Now that this step is completed, their version of the bill will be up for discussion and they will get the chance to vote on it after Thanksgiving.
There is still no way of knowing if there is enough support for it to pass through the Senate. However, because it was passed in the House after very little discussion and time, this is a big sign that it has the potential of getting passed before the end of the year.
~ American Liberty Report
