Unwrap President Trump's Christmas present and weep

A version of this appeared in the Sky Hi News 12 20 2017
https://www.skyhinews.com/news/muftic-unwrap-trumps-tax-reduction-christmas-present-and-weep/

At last we get the “”giant, beautiful” Christmas present President Donald Trump promised.  Some tears will be for joy and others from dismay. The final version has emerged and as you read this, the President may have  already signed it.

The GOP is celebrating because they finally got one piece of major legislation passed and it brings into reality  many of the denizens of the swamp’s visions of sugar plums dancing in their heads. Everyone  else will be affected differently.   Some financial impacts will happen soon  than later.  

If you are already wealthy, an oil driller  in the Arctic wilderness , or  a real estate oligarch like the Trump family, your tears will be of joy. If you love the reduction in corporate taxes to 21%, do a happy dance. You still got your same corporate tax breaks plus repeal of the AMT tax  on top of it.  If your income is mostly from Wall Street, yahoo. That is where most of those corporate benefits will go because  there is no incentive in the legislation for  job creation or wage increases, or even to expand and build more plants. Corporations are already cash rich and already could have done it if they wanted to.

The dismaying damage to pocket books is done by the legislation’s hit on  health insurance. .Your take home check will look bigger beginning this  February due to increases in individual standard deductions and  in withholding due to  tax  reductions in lower brackets for 2018. On the other hand,  if you are lower middle class, 4 million in 2019 with a total reaching 13 million by 2027  will  not be able to afford or want to afford, or be required to carry health insurance.,.Those losing insurance should  be prepared to face  bankruptcy since they will now be billed for the full cost of services. including check ups,  ER visits, birth control pills. and cancer screenings and  treatments .just like the old days before Obamacare.  If your children's health care was covered by CHIP, dig into your own pockets. The program has not been renewed.  If you are rich or poor,  your health insurance premiums will increase by 10% than otherwise  in the coming years.thanks to the removal of the mandate for individuals to carry insurance.

Political fallout could dim the  GOP’s victory glow in 2018 and 2020.. Polls of public  approval  of the tax bills (Marist, CBS, Quinnipiac,Gallup)   earlier in December ranged from below 30% to 35%, split along party lines., but swing independents were even more negative.  Polls reflected a  perception of unfairness,  that the rich benefit more than the middle class, though most of the middle class with  exceptions in upper brackets  will  get some degree of temporary  tax reductions.The final version tinkered  with some  details,  but did  little  to change the math  facts that the rich and corporations still benefit the most. . In 2025   all of these tax breaks to individuals will go away. Tax reductions to  business and corporations are forever.

There are   many media takes on specific  winners and losers in this legislation. . The opinion  that counts is from the  non- partisan Congressional funded Congressional Budget Office  because  it is  more  often  relied upon  by those shaping  legislation,.   The clearest up to date analysis expressed in plain English  and CBO based   I found  was done by the Associated Press and published on Yahoo News. https://finance.yahoo.com/news/look-winners-losers-under-gop-205042006.html.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/ap-fact-check-trump-considers-125236268.html
http://www.newsweek.com/trump-kill-obamacare-repealing-individual-mandate