Tax Basics

Policy Cheat Sheet

Too busy running your campaign to take notes? No problem, the Patriotic Millionaires have you covered! Here are the lines we use to briefly explain the tax policy you need to know.

PERSONAL TAX RATES:

Our tax code is deliberately designed to reward people who already have money over people who work for a living.

TAX “SIMPLIFICATION”:

Someone making $600,000 a year has virtually nothing in common with someone making $10 million, or $100 million a year – limiting the number of tax brackets doesn’t “simplify” the tax code, it just gives politicians another way to cut taxes for their millionaire donors.

CORPORATE RATE:

Corporate profits have never been higher, and corporate taxes have never been lower – if corporations are doing so well while middle class Americans struggle, those corporations should be required to pay more.

TERRITORIAL TAX SYSTEM:

The new Republican tax code taxes profits American companies earn here in America twice as much as profits they earn overseas and gives tax breaks to companies with manufacturing facilities in other countries, giving companies a massive incentive to move American jobs overseas.

THE ESTATE TAX:

The new Republican tax code requires working Americans to pay up to 37% of their income in taxes, but it allows the children of millionaires to inherit up to $22,400,000 without paying a single penny in taxes.

PASS-THROUGHS

The new Republican tax code’s tax cut for pass-through businesses is just another way for politicians to help their donors use accounting tricks to avoid taxes – only 10% of people claiming pass-through income are small business employers, and half conduct no business activity at all.

EARNED INCOME TAX CREDIT

Expanding the Earned Income Tax Credit would lift million of Americans out of poverty in a way that’s proven to not only effectively limit poverty, but also encourage work for low-income individuals.

CHILD TAX CREDIT

The increase in the Child Tax Credit from the Republican tax bill was wildly inadequate – we need to further expand it and make it fully refundable in order to lift millions of children out of poverty.

CARRIED INTEREST LOOPHOLE

The carried interest loophole is an absurd mischaracterization of income that allows about 5,000 of the richest people in America to divide (conservatively) $1.8 billion a year between themselves, for an average tax break of $300,000 a year.

STEPPED-UP BASIS

The stepped-up basis allows ultra-wealthy families to avoid paying billions in taxes, and should be repealed.

1031 EXCHANGE

1031 exchanges allow wealthy real estate developers and their families to expand their holdings and build massive real estate empires without ever paying a cent in capital gains taxes.