So, What to Think About the Tax Proposal?

 So, What to Think About the Tax Proposal?

Yesterday, the Trump administration released its much anticipated tax plan. During the unveiling, Steven Mnuchin called it “the biggest tax cut” in American history. What’s in it? And what will happen? Let’s dig in.

-This plan cuts the corporate tax rate to 15 percent from the current rate of 35 percent. Folks who own their own business would be taxed at the 15 percent corporate rate instead of the personal income tax rate.

-Individual tax rates would be reduced down to three brackets, 10 percent, 25 percent, and 35 percent, and the standard deduction would double to $12,700 for individuals and $25,400 for joint filers.

-Itemized deductions, except for mortgage interest and charitable donations, would be eliminated.

-A one-time repatriation tax would let companies bring back overseas cash at a lower rate.

-The estate tax and the alternative minimum tax are done away with.

-The plan does not include a border adjustment tax.

Contrary to suggestions earlier in the week, this plan does not include infrastructure spending designed to woo Democrats. There are no budget cuts associated with this either. According to Mnuchin, the plan will pay for itself through economic growth. He says he expects the GDP to grow at three percent annually. (The corporate rate cut could possibly pay for itself. It worked very well in both Canada and the UK.)

Importantly, the plan is a broad outline, not specific legislative text. Paul Ryan and Mitch McConnell responded yesterday to the plan saying that for Congress it “will serve as critical guideposts.”

Can something like this pass Congress? It’s far too early to say. There are a lot of tricks that could trip this up and at the same time, there’s lots of tricks to get this through. Where it needs 51 or 60 votes in the Senate depends on the final legislative language and how it's scored.

There are lots of predictions both ways on how this could break down and no doubt we’ll hear more about it in the coming weeks and months. But at the moment, it’s too early to make any predictions.

The Glorification of Science and the Reality of Scientific Responsibility

The Glorification of Science and the Reality of Scientific Responsibility

Science has and likely will continue to create consequences for humans on this earth. There is ample data in the historical record to prove such. What seems to have gotten lost in today’s world is the glorification of science without accepting the unintentional consequences of what science creates.

Some have argued that the answer to the question of “responsibility” is "no" —that it is not researcher's’ responsibility how science gets used in society.  But that is sophistry.  Scientists are responsible for both the impacts they intend and some of the impacts they do not intend, if they are readily foreseeable in specific detail; even if they consider the future or not. 

These are the standards to which we are all held as moral agents.  If I were to negligently throw a used match into a dry field (merely because I wanted to dispose of it), for example, I would be responsible for the resulting wildfire.  In contrast, Einstein was not responsible for the use of his E=mc2 equation to build an atomic bomb and its use in wartime, though the scientists at Los Alamos were. Or should he?

The Birth of a Movement!

The Birth of a Movement!

Donald Trump’s election gave voice to the growing conviction of many Americans that their elected officials had strayed from their constitutional obligations—that they had been derelict in allowing the destruction of limited government.

A number of critical issues face our country: eliminating regulations, cutting taxes, creating jobs, enforcing immigration laws, and fixing healthcare. We will see if the President can play a critical role in shaping policy in these areas. Whether he is successful will have impact for generations to come.

But already there is much, and growing, resistance to what the President proposes be done.

This raises important questions: What is the extent and what are the limits of presidential power in regard to public policy? What is the proper relation of the president with the other two constitutional branches? And what is his relation to the “fourth branch”—the enormous federal bureaucracy?

Thomas Jefferson wrote, "Educate and inform the whole mass of the people... They are the only sure reliance for the preservation of our liberty.”

For the “Movement” to succeed the public must be educated in the spirit of Thomas Jefferson.