Democrats downplay nonpartisan analysis showing inflation bill increases taxes
A spokesperson for Senate Finance Committee Chairman Ron Wyden tells FOX Business the analysis is 'incomplete'
Democrats scrambled Monday to downplay a nonpartisan assessment of their inflation bill showing it would lead to nearly every American paying higher taxes.
The Democrats maintained that the Inflation Reduction Act would fulfill President Biden's promise not to tax Americans who earn less than $400,000 per year and instead tax large corporations. Over the weekend, Republicans published a Friday analysis from the Joint Committee on Taxation (JCT) showing that most Americans would pay higher taxes under the legislation.
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"A family making less than $400,000 will not pay one penny in additional taxes under the Inflation Reduction Act," Ashley Schapitl, a spokesperson for Senate Finance Committee Chairman Ron Wyden, D-Ore., told FOX Business in an email. "This is the same trickle down economic argument Republicans have been making for decades, and the American people don’t buy it."
"The American people are smart," she continued. "They knew that Republicans’ 2017 corporate giveaway did not give them a tax cut. They know that making companies with billions in profits pay their fair share isn’t raising their taxes."
Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., is pictured alongside Sens. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., and Angus King, I-Maine, on Oct. 26, 2021. (Photo by Drew Angerer/Getty Images / Getty Images)
The JCT study concluded that, in 2023, taxpayers making less than $10,000 would see their tax rate increase from 7.3% to 7.6% while those making less than $200,000 would pay a total of $16.7 billion in additional taxes.
Schapitl argued the analysis was "incomplete" since it doesn't factor in tax credits and incentives written into the legislation.
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"The analysis Republicans are pointing to is also incomplete," Schapitl said. "It doesn’t include the benefits to middle-class families of making health insurance premiums and prescription drugs more affordable. The same goes for clean energy incentives for families."
The JCT didn't factor in health care or prescription drug impacts on taxes under the bill, but listed about 20 clean energy provisions it did factor into the analysis.
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Meanwhile, Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., who unveiled the bill last week, told reporters Monday that he would "agree to disagree" about the JCT's findings, according to CNN reporter Manu Raju. Sen. Chris Murphy, D-Conn., a member of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, also pushed back on the study.
"The only tax increases in the Inflation Reduction Act are a requirement that the biggest corporations pay SOME corporate tax and the closure of an egregious loophole for some billionaire/millionaire investors," Murphy tweeted Monday. "This $$ is used to cut drug and energy costs for regular Americans."
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The Connecticut senator also blasted Senate Finance Committee Ranking Member Mike Crapo for saying the JCT concluded the bill raises taxes on Americans earning less than $400,000 per year.
"That's absolutely not what the JCT says," he tweeted.
Thomas Barthold, the chief of staff at the JCT, told FOX Business earlier Monday that the tax increases highlighted in the analysis were mainly a result of the 15% minimum corporate tax included in the Inflation Reduction Act.