I was amused that the editors of the Washington Post’s have apparently just discovered Article, Section 7 of the U. S. Cosntitution:
All Bills for raising Revenue shall originate in the House of Representatives; but the Senate may propose or concur with Amendments as on other Bills.
Not in the Senate and especially not in the White House:
As The Post’s Jeff Stein and Tyler Pager reported, objections from lawmakers in Mr. Biden’s own party range from the categorical — Sen. Joe Manchin III’s (D-W.Va.) objection to lifting the tax rate on any corporation beyond 25 percent — to the parochial — blue-state Democrats’ demand for expanded deductibility of the high state and local taxes their upper-income constituents pay. The most recent development in this vein was an appeal from farm-state Democrats led by Rep. Cindy Axne (D-Iowa) seeking protection against Mr. Biden’s plan to eliminate a huge loophole in the capital gains tax. Closing the loophole would increase what people owe the government when they inherit appreciated assets such as stocks, bonds — or agricultural land.
Mr. Biden has appropriately declared himself willing to negotiate, but he and congressional leaders must stand firmly against special pleading from within their own party, lest his plans become bogged down or fail altogether. This will be difficult, given the Democrats’ razor-thin majorities in both houses, which means tiny handfuls of lawmakers, or individual ones, can exercise decisive leverage.
Mr. Biden’s best bet is to articulate broad principles, such as pay-as-you-go and tax-code equity, and reject any and all ideas inconsistent with them. Undoing the limitation on state and local tax payment deductibility, and thereby undoing one of the few progressive features of the 2017 Republican tax law, would fail this test. Depending on the details, Mr. Manchin’s 25 percent corporate tax rate could pass, since it represents a 4 percentage point increase over the 21 percent established in 2017. As for pay-as-you-go, Mr. Biden has already said he is “not willing to not pay for†his plans, useful pushback against the temptation among some Democrats to skip the tough politics of taxes altogether and put the entire spending boost on the national credit card.
Most of the Congress’s power resides in its control over the tax code and its ability to carve out exceptions for causes or groups it favors. Asking it to abstain from that would be a bitter pill.
I also have a question. If the gauge of whether something is good policy is how it polls:
The White House has reminded Democratic lawmakers of poll numbers showing wide support for raising taxes on corporations and the tiny sliver of upper-income households targeted in Mr. Biden’s plans.
why do we need a Congress at all?
