US Senate passes sweeping tax overhaul bill • Hacker News Board

Re: US Senate passes sweeping tax overhaul bill

#121

Post by jessaustin » Sun, Dec 03, 2017, 1:43 PM UTC

djur wrote: post #53

jessaustin wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"We have to pass the bill so that you can find out what is in it away from the fog of the controversy."

A comment about a bill that took almost a year to draft and which was passed under regular order. And now hypocrites who used that quote to attack Pelosi are supporting this abominable bill, which was passed without any kind of analysis and without even the slightest pretense that anyone voting for it had read it.

The legislative process is always a mess. No matter how much we pretend (in one direction, because double standards), no significant law passes without essentially indefensible actions "behind the scenes". We may feel that one bill is super-duper and the other one is terrible, but we shouldn't let that blind us to the inevitably shabby nature of the process. Likewise, selectively noticing that nature for the purpose of criticizing particular bills makes for unconvincing political argument.

Re: US Senate passes sweeping tax overhaul bill

#122

Post by calvinbhai » Tue, Dec 05, 2017, 3:43 AM UTC

I'm a temp immigrant in US, who is equally frustrated with the Trump hating democrat supporters, the Hillary-hating Trump supporters and the neutrals.

Based on what I know from my own small sample set of data, makes me believe that the the Trump vote base is strong, and considerable in number, and is super happy with this tax overhaul.

They see it as "Trump kept his promise", by simplifying the tax code, reducing taxes on his vote base, increasing taxes on the tax bracket that trump voters considered to be something like "free money mongers" and of course, its going to affect the democrat strongholds.

What I find funny, is that many Trump haters are still starting a conversation by presuming that majority of the country hates this tax reform (its probably the top 10 most populous cities of US and California). I think people need to go out of democrat stronghold areas and get some real feedback.

I'm curious to see how this sweeping tax overhaul works out in the long run

Re: US Senate passes sweeping tax overhaul bill

#123

Post by marcell » Wed, Dec 06, 2017, 6:38 AM UTC

jessaustin wrote: post #43

sytelus wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I assumed standard family (married filed jointly, 2 kids, standard deduction).

Yeah somehow I don't see itemized deductions as a "middle class" thing. Even less so with the standard deduction increase.

About 1/3 of households itemize deductions, including myself. I live in a two bedroom condo with two kids, I consider myself "middle class." Itemizing deductions is much more common in high tax ("Blue") states due to the state/local tax deduction. This tax "cut" is targeted to raise taxes on blue states by eliminating that.

The standard deduction increase is a bit of a trick, since they removed the personal deduction. So it's not a "doubling" of the standard deduction, but an increase of a few thousand. It is not enough to cover the removal of other deductions for many middle/upper-middle class families.