Tag: Trump wealthcare

Trump’s opportunity zones are supposed to help the poor. But billionaire GOP donors cashed in instead

A Trump tax break designed to help impoverished neighborhoods has lined the pockets of wealthy Republican donors. President Trump and congressional Republicans passed new tax legislation in 2017, introducing one provision in particular that was supposed to encourage business owners to invest in poor neighborhoods. Under the code, these communities are labeled opportunity zones, and if a developer builds anything in these zones, they receive a tax break. This reward is for new projects only.

At least, that’s how it’s supposed to work.

Instead, it appears that former Florida Gov. Rick Scott (R) bent the rules for a few of his wealthy friends, ProPublica reported Thursday. Scott, now a senator for the Sunshine State, designated the Rybovich superyacht marina an opportunity zone at the request of owner Wayne Huizenga Jr. Huizenga Jr. is the son of Wayne Huizenga Sr., the late billionaire co-owner of Blockbuster Video and founder of Waste Management.

View the complete November 14 article by Ashleigh Atwell on the Mic.com website here.

Experts: Trump Tax And Trade Policies Slowing Economy

Economic growth in the United States slowed to just 1.9 percent in the past three months, far slower than promised Donald Trump made during his 2016 campaign. The sluggish growth is even worse than the second-quarter numbers, when the economy grew at 2 percent, NPR reported on Wednesday.

In his annual budget to Congress, Trump predicted a more robust 3.2 percent growth.

“That’s not going to happen,” Diane Swonk, chief economist at Grant Thornton, told NPR, adding, “we won’t get a 3-plus percent growth rate for the year.”

View the complete October 31 article by Dan Desai Martin on the National Memo website here.

Mnuchin, The White House Intervene To Secure Opportunity Zone Tax Breaks … To Benefit Wealthy Allies

On Friday, Trump again tried to tout his tax law’s opportunity zone tax break as a boon to low-income and minority communities. In reality, the tax break has only amounted to another handout to wealthy investors, and the Trump administration has even directly intervened to ensure bigger tax breaks for their friends and donors.

Mnuchin personally intervened to secure an opportunity zone tax break for a wealthy investor, fraudster and longtime friend.

New York Times: “Last year, after pressure from Mr. Milken’s business partner and other landowners, the Treasury Department ignored its own guidelines on how to select opportunity zones and made the area eligible for the tax break, according to people involved in the discussions and records reviewed by The Times. The unusual decision was made at the personal instruction of Mr. Mnuchin, according to internal Treasury Department emails. It came shortly after he had spent time with Mr. Milken at an event his institute hosted.” Continue reading “Mnuchin, The White House Intervene To Secure Opportunity Zone Tax Breaks … To Benefit Wealthy Allies”

20 Very Rich Americans Demand Higher Taxes On Wealth

When the grand vacation homes of Newport Beach were empty on a beautiful Memorial Day weekend, Molly Munger decided it was time for the U.S. to consider taxing wealth.

As her family’s boat moved through the harbor a few years ago, Munger, whose father is a billionaire investor, saw that many of her neighbors’ houses were sitting dark and vacant. She knew why: The owners now controlled enough money to holiday at one of their several other luxury homes. It didn’t sit right, she said.

When the grand vacation homes of Newport Beach were empty on a beautiful Memorial Day weekend, Molly Munger decided it was time for the U.S. to consider taxing wealth.

View the complete October 27 article from the Associated Press on the National Memo website here.

Symbol of ’80s Greed Stands to Profit From Trump Tax Break for Poor Areas

New York Times logoRENO, Nev. — In the 1980s, Michael Milken embodied Wall Street greed. A swashbuckling financier, he was charged with playing a central role in a vast insider-trading scheme and was sent to prisonfor violating federal securities and tax laws. He was an inspiration for the Gordon Gekko character in the film “Wall Street.”

Mr. Milken has spent the intervening decades trying to rehabilitate his reputation through an influential nonprofit think tank, the Milken Institute, devoted to initiatives “that advance prosperity.”

These days, the Milken Institute is a leading proponent of a new federal tax break that was intended to coax wealthy investors to plow money into distressed communities known as “opportunity zones.” The institute’s leaders have helped push senior officials in the Trump administration to make the tax incentive more generous, even though it is under fire for being slanted toward the wealthy.

View the complete October 26 article by Eric Lipton and Jesse Drucker on The New York Times website here.

House Dems take aim at ‘trust fund babies’ with estate tax designed to combat obscene wealth inequality

AlterNet logoCalifornia Congressman Jimmy Gomez on Friday introduced legislation in the Democrat-controlled U.S. House that aims to address “our country’s rapidly increasing wealth inequality by strengthening the estate tax and ensuring the wealthiest among us pay their fair share.”

“Trust fund babies who have done nothing to earn their wealth besides being born into the right family have no right to pay a lower tax rate on their millions than hard-working Americans do on the income that they work for.”

—Charlie Simmons, Patriotic Millionaires

The For the 99.8% Act would impose a progressive tax on the estates of the richest Americans. Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), a 2020 Democratic presidential candidate, introduced the companion bill in the Republican-controlled Senate in January.

View the complete October 26 article from Common Dreams on the AlterNet website here.

No, the economy isn’t working well for all Americans — and a new survey proves it

AlterNet logoPresident Donald Trump has not hesitated to boast about the state of the U.S. economy, insisting that his policies have brought about an economic miracle (never mind the fact that unemployment was going way down during President Barack Obama’s second term). But two of the Democratic presidential primary candidates who are hoping to unseat Trump in 2020, Sen. Elizabeth Warren and Sen. Bernie Sanders, have repeatedly stressed that big chunks of the U.S. population are not feeling the economic recovery — and a new survey by the personal finance website WalletHub bears that out.

The United States’ national unemployment rate, according to Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) figures, was 3.7% in August and 3.5% in September. When Obama was a lame duck in December 2016, it was 4.7% compared to 10% in October 2009 during the worst of the Great Recession. So Trump inherited an economy that was in recovery under Obama; he didn’t create an economic miracle single-handedly, contrary to what one often hears on Fox News. Further, unemployment figures don’t tell the whole story, and WalletHub’s survey underscores the fact that millions of Americans are still struggling.

According to WalletHub’s survey, released this week, “78 million Americans” say their finances are a “horror show” — that includes 34% of Millennials and 16% of Baby Boomers. Moreover, 85% of Americans, WalletHub reports, plan on spending less this Halloween compared to Halloween 2018.

View the complete October 25 article by Alex Henderson on the AlterNet website here.

Treasury May Ease Restrictions On Offshore Tax Avoidance

The Treasury Department is mulling plans to weaken or eliminate an Obama-era regulation meant to discourage companies from moving their cash offshore to avoid paying taxes, Bloomberg reported Tuesday.

In 2016, President Barack Obama put a rule in place to remove incentives for companies shuffling money overseas to make it appear on paper as if they had less profit. Lower profits would mean a lower tax bill in the United States.

Treasury is contemplating this move at the same time the Congressional Budget Office reports that the national deficit is just shy of $1 trillion this year, thanks in large part to lower corporate taxes in the wake of the 2017 tax law.

View the complete October 10 article by Dan Desai Martin on the National Memo website here.

For the first time in history, U.S. billionaires paid a lower tax rate than the working class last year

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A new book-length study on the tax burden of the ultrarich begins with a startling finding: In 2018, for the first time in history, America’s richest billionaires paid a lower effective tax rate than the working class.

Continue reading “For the first time in history, U.S. billionaires paid a lower tax rate than the working class last year”