Welcome to the New Gilded Age

In numerous past posts I have argued that one of the ultimate goals of today's Republican Party is to restore the wild wealth disparities of the Gilded Age when Rockefellers, Goulds, DuPonts and others amassed huge fortunes, paid little in taxes, and the vast majority of the rest of the citizenry struggled to simply get by.   The new Republican tax plan is a prime example of how today's GOP - which bears no resemblance to the GOP of Eisenhower or even of Reagan - seeks only to benefit the wealthy while playing its base for fools by playing to base prejudices based on race and religion.  It's ugly, its the antithesis of Christian values, and it will harm the long term prospect of many Americans.  A column in the Washington Post lays out how the new tax "reform" delivers wealth to the wealthy while throwing crumbs at best to most of us.  Here are excerpts:

Corporations are people, my friend. And this is where they feed. Room 1100 of the Longworth Building, with its ionic columns, gilt-fringed curtains and eagle-topped frieze, has for 80 years been the home of the tax-writing House Ways and Means Committee. But perhaps never before have corporations wielded their power as openly as they have here this week.

As the panel moves to approve the Republican tax plan, this is the room where it happens — where the rich will get richer, where everybody else will be forced to shoulder a greater share of the tax burden, and where a trillion dollars of tax breaks for corporations are being passed by lawmakers who work for these very corporations.

In one case, literally.  On Monday afternoon, as the committee began its markup of the tax bill, there on the top level of the dais, three seats from the chairman, munching from a bag of potato chips, was Rep. Patrick J. Tiberi (R-Ohio). Tiberi announced last month that he’s quitting Congress to lead the Ohio Business Roundtable, a group of “the CEOs of the state’s largest and most influential business enterprises.” Tiberi filed a notification with the House Ethics Committee that he was negotiating terms of employment with the group.

This isn’t illegal or against House rules. But a lawmaker drafting and passing legislation that benefits the people with whom he is negotiating the terms of his employment? That stinks.

So it goes in this new gilded age. The $1.5 trillion tax cut has $1 trillion in corporate tax breaks. The idea was that the corporate tax rate could be lowered if you eliminated corporate tax loopholes. Now corporations will have the lower rates and the loopholes.

Individuals lose the ability to deduct state and local taxes, tax preparation, moving expenses and most medical expenses. But corporations — think of them as Very Important Persons with superhuman privileges — can still deduct these same expenses.

“Will a teacher in my district who buys pens, pencils and paper for his students be able to deduct these costs from his tax returns under this plan?” He will not.

“Will a corporation that buys pens, pencils and papers for its workers be able to deduct those costs from its tax returns?” It will.

“Will a firefighter in my district be able to deduct the state and local sales taxes that she pays from her tax return?” She will not.

“Will a corporation be able to deduct sales taxes on business purchases?” It will.

As the corporate welfare is doled out, the same bill widens the gap between the rich and everybody else. The liberal Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy concluded that the middle fifth of Americans would get a modest tax cut of $460 (1.4 percent of their income) in 2018, while the richest 1 percent would have a cut of $64,720 (2.5 percent of their income). Even the conservative-leaning Tax Foundation, using a more favorable methodology, acknowledges the plan would cost the federal government $989 billion over a decade.

Corporations have had their way with Washington before. In 2003, Rep. Billy Tauzin (R-La.) caused an uproar when he quit Congress to become the top drug-industry lobbyist right after he helped to write and pass the Medicare prescription-drug expansion. He earned harsh denunciations as a symbol of Washington’s revolving door.

What’s different now is the reaction. Tiberi continues to help shepherd the corporate tax bill even after naming his corporate employer — and he is applauded. . . . . .  If only those financing his next endeavor didn’t benefit so handsomely from his current one.