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The SALT cap increased “taxes on hardworking families,” says the letter. That’s “untenable given the dire economic conditions caused by the pandemic.” It goes on to say, “In short, middle-class Americans are struggling under this federal tax burden, while corporations – which are still able to fully deduct SALT as business expenses – are profiting because of the same law. The negative impacts of the SALT cap on middle class families are particularly egregious when you consider that in the states most affected by this cap, the federal government already takes more in federal taxes than the states receive in federal support, effectively subsidizing federal payments to other states.”
Tax analysts on the right and the left have documented why that’s completely false. The cap on SALT deductions was a windfall for the middle class and hammered high income taxpayers. The conservative Tax Foundation explained why here, and the liberal Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy, ITEP, wrote this in an article opposing elimination of the cap:
ITEP estimated that this would cost more than $90 billion in a single year. We found that 62 percent of the benefits would go to the richest 1 percent and 86 percent would go to the richest 5 percent. There is no state where this is a primarily middle-class issue. In every state and the District of Columbia, more than half of the benefits would go to the richest 5 percent of taxpayers. In all but six states, more than half of the benefits would go to the richest 1 percent.
Author(s): Mark Glennon
Publication Date: 5 April 2021
Publication Site: Wirepoints