Is this Trump’s tax plan? If it is, it sure beats what we have now.
In an interview Tuesday, Donald Trump teased the details of his yet-to-be revealed plan to reform the U.S. tax code, telling CNN, “I know exactly what I want to do, I just don’t want to announce it yet.”
Trump told CNN host Chris Cuomo, “Our tax code is too complicated, and we can simplify it so easily.”
“How?” Cuomo asked the billionaire real-estate mogul.
“By using intelligence, by having common sense,” Trump replied. “I want to put H&R Block out of business.”
Trump went on to explain to Cuomo that he has a tax-reform plan but is not “prepared to tell you right now on your fantastic show.”
While Trump has yet to unveil his plan, largely ignored by media is that in his 2011 book, “Time to Get Tough: Making America #1 Again,” he laid out a plan to completely transform the tax code with a uniform proposal for all Americans to pay lower taxes.
Trump’s revenue prescription, which he labeled his 1-5-10-15 income-tax plan in the book four years ago, could form the basis for his campaign’s platform on the issue.
In the book, Trump wrote that his plan is so simple, it could eliminate the need for accountants and tax preparers, which he referenced in his comment Tuesday about putting H&R Block out of business.
He wrote in 2011: “Imagine your paycheck was 40 percent higher than it currently is. What could you do with 40 percent more wealth? How many jobs and opportunities for others could you create?
Grover Norquist’s “End the IRS Before It Ends Us: How to Restore a Low Tax, High Growth, Wealthy America” shows how to make the nation thrive.
“The longer you really think about it the madder you will get,” he wrote, “especially when you consider the waste, fraud, and abuse the federal government traffics in as it inflicts its self-defeating policies on hard-working Americans.”
Here’s Trump’s proposed income-tax plan:
- Those making up to $30,000 will pay 1 percent.
- Income from $30,000 to $100,000 is assessed a flat 5 percent tax.
- $100,000 to $1 million income will be taxed at 10 percent.
- $1 million or above will be taxed 15 percent.
“It’s clear and fair,” wrote Trump. “Best of all, it can be filled out on the back of a postcard and will save Americans big bucks on accountants and massive amounts of time wasted attempting to decipher the tax code.”
