"Tax the rich!" they declare on the campaign trail and the social scene. But when it comes to legislating, Democrats show they don't really mean it.
Meanwhile, there's an aggressive push in the House to include a tax cut in Democrats' tax-and-spending bill that would only apply to the rich. It is aggressively backed by Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer. They want to allow unlimited deduction of state and local taxes. Under current law, anyone can deduct up to $10,000 of state and local taxes on their federal taxes. Those deductions are moot for the vast majority of taxpayers, thanks to the large standard deduction. (This large standard deduction and the $10,000 cap on state and local tax deductions were both part of the Trump tax cut bill.)
Democrats are also pushing a $12,500 tax credit for those buying electric vehicles. A married couple would have to earn at least $200,000 to owe that much in taxes. So basically, this is another tax break for wealthy lawyers and doctors who buy Teslas for their wives.
Finally, the Democrats have totally unsurprisingly decided to leave the "carried interest" loophole in place. This means that investment managers can continue to pretend their income is just investment gains so that they pay the lower capital gains rate instead of the higher income tax rate. Consistently, Democrats have railed against this loophole in public to shake donations out of scared fund managers and cast themselves as populists. But they are leaving the loophole in place.
