Conventional wisdom says tax cuts have lost their political power. "Cutting taxes has run its course," "America's great fever for lower taxes . . . has cooled," and "Republicans relied too easily on tax cuts," are among the assertions I've seen recently from different pundits.
One reason offered for the alleged decline of tax cuts as a potent issue is that since 2000, tax cuts have taken 13 million filers off of the income tax rolls. Today, one-third of all filers have no federal income tax liability and nearly 40% of all federal income taxes are now paid by the top 1% of taxpayers (60% by the top 5%). The fewer people who are paying taxes, the fewer people who care about tax cuts, or so goes the reasoning.
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