Watch campaign 2020 coverage every day on cspan. App. N on the cspan radio your place for the unfiltered view of politics. Joining us now is scott hodge, the president of the Tax Foundation and here to talk about the tax proposals for both President Trump and joe biden. Good morning. Guest thanks for having me. Host for those who dont know the foundation, how would you describe your mission, and tell us again how you are financially back. Guest we are a nonprofit, think tank. We were born in 1947 by a group of Business Leaders who felt the American Public and needed more data and information and nonpartisan analysis of tax not just at the federal level, but we are also doing a lot of work at the state and local level, working with legislators and governors across the state to improve their tax systems. You is theopic for tax policies of both lets start with joe biden and the things he is proposing as far as tax policies. Some of the highlights, i will read them and then you can comment on them, raise the rates securityly a social tax to earnings above 400,000, also tax Capital Gains and dividends at ordinary rates of annual incomes of more than 1 million. Those proposals, what would they accomplish if they were enacted . Guest it would certainly make the tax code much more progressive than it is today. Intendingat biden is and what he has been very honest about what he is trying to do. We analyze his overall tax plans, we found that it would raise about 3 trillion over the next decade. However, when you factor in the Economic Impact of these taxes, and they would slow the economy, according to our model, it would raise about 2. 6 trillion over a decade. We do find it would actually lower the size of the economy by 1. 5 . It would perhaps reduce the employment by a little over half a million jobs and reduce wages by about 1 . While it is intended to raise revenues to pay for spending programs, there is an economic consequence according to our models. Host we hear mr. Biden say quite frequently those increased taxes are only of concern if you make over 400 thousand dollars. What do you think of that . Certainly, from a legal perspective, those are the folks who will write the checks. We economists tend to look at what happens after that and the flow through to the economy from those taxes. That is where we find the economic burden of some of those taxes will fall on lower and middle class americans. The long term, everyone will see a slight reduction in their aftertax incomes because of the economic harm or reduction in the size of the economy that will result from those taxes. Host how does that fall to all americans . Guest the Corporate Tax increases that are in his proposal amount to about half of that 3 trillion tax increase. We estimate about half of that will fall on the backs of workers through lower wages. That is a pretty common assumption among most economists. Even though he is proposing to tax corporations with higher tax rates and fewer deductions, we find that the economic consequences of that will actually fall on workers with lower wages. Host you mentioned the Corporate Taxes. The plan for joe biden has increased that rate to 20 currently from 21 . He would also impose something called a minimum tax for large companies. Guest part of the motivation for this is the concern that corporations report one thing to the irs in terms of their income and Tax Liability, but they tell their shareholders a very different story through their Financial Reports. That is often the concern they are not paying their fair share because they report in a much lower tax burden versus what they are showing their shareholders or vice versa. By offering this 15 minimum tax they arencome, essentially forcing companies to look at their Tax Liability in both ways and pay the higher of the two. Gain theirhey cant Financial Reports versus their tax returns. Host this last one sounds complicated, so i will just read it to you. U. S. Firms toe on 21 . Guest the tax cuts in jobs asked, which was enacted in 2017 change the International Tax rules that had been governing u. S. Companies for decades. It moved to what is called a territorial system, reducing the taxes that Companies Pay on their foreign income, but we placed a minimum tax on those so that they could not hide some of taxr products in low countries like bermuda or the cayman islands. This was a way to try to avoid or prevent what they call Profit Shifting or tax avoidance. This minimum tax is set at about 10. 5 currently. Biden would increase that to 21 , which Means Companies would face a much higher tax burden on their foreign earnings. Host one more question about the proposals from joe biden. If i were a person who made much of my money because of stocks or anything like that primarily, what happens to me hypothetically . Guest if you are a millionaire, you would pay much higher taxes on your Capital Gains and dividends. He is proposing to virtually double the tax rate on Capital Gains and dividends from 20 today. They would have to pay the income tax rate of 39. 6 on those Capital Gains and dividends. It doesnt stop there because there is the obamacare surtax on those earnings. That would increase the rate to 43. 4 . That would be the highest rate ever on capitol hill gains and dividends or at least since the carter administration. That is a big change for high income earners. Host our guest joins us to talk about tax proposals. You can ask him questions. If you support the president and mike pence, one line, if you and kamalae biden harris, others, another line. We will start with an unspecified tax cut to boost takehome pay and also an unspecified made in america tax credit. It is here again, difficult to analyze the president s proposals because they are so vague. He has just proposed or at least released a set of talking points or bullet points. It is very difficult for those of us on the outside to try to analyze them or even understand what he is trying to do. I think what he is saying, number one is that in his budget this year, they did propose extending the tax cuts and jobs act at least for individual taxpayers. And of those tax rates lower tax burdens on middle income people would begin to expire after 2025. His budget would propose extending those. In terms of some of these other proposals, such as the made in america tax credit, he has been very vague. What is interesting about it to me is that it is kind of a step toward industrial policy where a lot of the proposals are really aimed at trying to incentivize investment here in certain types of industries such as pharma or manufacturing and so forth. It is kind of a departure from traditional or republican orthodoxy, which is just to lower tax rates and broaden the base and let the market work. Host one of those things highlighted is something called 100 expensing for Certain Industries including pharmaceutical if they bring their manufacturing back. Guest that is a proposal we would recommend be broadbased for all industries. The most is one of powerful economic incentives you can have in a tax system. Only newit encourages investment rather than old investment. We think it is very progrowth. The Tax Foundation economists would disagree to just applying at a Certain Industries over others. We dont think you should play favorites through the tax code. Host something the president talks quite a bit about particularly when it comes to benefiting the africanamerican community, opportunity zones. Guest that was another proposal put into the tax cuts and jobs act a few years ago sponsored by senator scott from south carolina. It is aimed at low income communities to try to essentially allow investors to do further Capital Gains on that investment indefinitely. As they are trying to profit those communities and increase the amount of investment there. Were still waiting to see the impact of those, but the president has offered to expand that. Getting back to the manufacturing issue, i should mention that joe biden also has a made in america tax credit as well. What is interesting is to see both parties kind of move toward this industrial policy through the tax system. It could be because the results of the covid crisis, where there is a lot of concern about supply chains, the fact a lot of pharma manufacturing is done abroad rather than here in the united states. Both parties are maybe groping toward different types of tax policies that will incentivize companies to bring back a lot of the manufacturing to the u. S. Rather than have it overseas. Host there is a viewer off of twitter asking to explain your models saying that, to all economists agree with your findings on models . Guest our model is fairly mainstream. Equilibriumral model and assumes the u. S. Economy is in equilibrium economy where capital can flow back and forth pretty freely. It is considered a fairly mainstream model. If you look at the other groups that have done analysis on the biden plan, in particular, most of the results are fairly similar if you normalize their assumptions. We all find that in some way, the biden plan would reduce the size of the economy, lower the number of jobs in the economy and lower wages as well. One of those outliers would be moodys because their analysis says joe biden proposals would produce rebounds and economic growth. Guest i think we have to separate what the models are looking at. Some only look at tax policy and try to make estimates on bidens spending plans. We estimate he would raise 3 trillion for his tax increases. His spending proposals are somewhere in the neighborhood of 5 trillion or even higher. What moodys and others have tried to do is estimate how that spending would impact economic growth. That is something beyond our model. We were not comfortable going in that direction because we dont think there is enough consensus around how different types of spending will impact the economy. The Congressional Budget Office at things like infrastructure spending. While it can have a modest increase in economic growth, it is about half the you are watching cspan. Created by americas table Cable Television company as a Public Service and brought to you today by your television provider. Win four need to senate seats currently in republican hands to take control of the senate. The race in maine is considered to be one of the most competitive. Next, Susan Collins and sarah savage max lin and lisa participate in a debate. This is live coverage on cspan. Tonight in conjunction with the Maine State Chamber ponders chamber of commerce, we present the program. This is an opportunity to try to get clarity about the candidates and where they stand. We planned to hold this in person and were set up to do so but with the senate still in session, senator collins