https://www.finance.senate.gov/ranking-members-news/crapo-brady-introduce-bill-to-protect-taxpayer-rights-and-privacy

Tax Gap Reform And IRS Enforcement Act Provides Guardrails Around Proposed IRS Funding  

Washington, D.C.–Seeking to protect taxpayers against Democrats’ campaign to monitor Americans’ bank accounts, place taxpayer finances in a surveillance dragnet, and provide massive, additional mandatory funding to IRS for an army of IRS agents, U.S. Senate Finance Committee Ranking Member Mike Crapo (R-Idaho) and U.S. House Ways and Means Republican Leader Kevin Brady (R-Texas) introduced the Tax Gap Reform and Internal Revenue Service (IRS) Enforcement Act.   

“In light of recent proposals to massively expand the IRS, with unprecedented amounts of mandatory funding, and the IRS’s continued abuses of taxpayer rights and privacy, any additional IRS funding and monitoring of Americans’ private finances must come with guardrails to help protect against abuses,”said Crapo.  “This legislation places important guardrails around IRS funding to protect taxpayers’ rights and privacy.”   

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Proposal To Close Loopholes Allowing Wealthy Investors, Mega-Corporations To Use Partnerships To Avoid Paying Tax

Senate Finance Committee Chair Ron Wyden, D-Ore., today unveiled draft legislation to close loopholes that allow wealthy investors and mega-corporations to use pass-through entities, primarily partnerships, to avoid paying their fair share of taxes.

Seventy percent of partnership income accrues to the top 1 percent. Current partnership tax rules are too complicated for the IRS to enforce, turning partnerships into a preferred tax avoidance strategy for wealthy investors and mega-corporations. Although computers can check a wage earner’s return, the IRS needs highly-skilled specialists to audit partnerships. It audited only about 0.03 percent of the partnership returns filed for tax year 2018.

Wyden’s bill would remove the complexity in current partnership rules by closing loopholes that essentially allow partners to pick and choose how, and whether, to pay tax. Simply closing these loopholes would raise at least $172 billion, without raising tax rates.

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U.S. Senate Committee On Finance

The top Republicans on the U.S. Senate Finance Committee, the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee, and the U.S. Senate Banking Committee expressed serious concerns with the Administration’s recent suggestions it is considering circumventing the Senate’s constitutional treaty authority in implementing a global tax agreement.  Finance Committee Ranking Member Mike Crapo (R-Idaho), Foreign Relations Committee Ranking Member Jim Risch (R-Idaho) and Banking Committee Ranking Member Pat Toomey (R-Pennsylvania) wrote Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen today asking for clarification of recent comments, reiterating the importance of constitutionally mandated congressional approval of tax treaties.  The letter comes as the Organisation for Economic Development and Co-operation (OECD) is negotiating an agreement on global tax rules.

From the letter:

As you know, under the U.S. Constitution, a bilateral or multilateral tax treaty would require the advice and consent of the Senate, with a two-thirds vote of approval.  Further, we are unaware of any existing congressional authorization that would permit the Administration to conclude a lesser international agreement, such as a congressional-executive agreement.  As described, the nature of changes required to implement Pillar One necessitates the conclusion of a treaty, not a congressional-executive agreement or other legislative override.

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Biden Global Tax Deal Puts Politics Over Progress

Brady, Crapo: Biden Global Tax Deal Puts Politics Over Progress, Surrenders Fate of U.S. Economy to Foreign Competitors

In a joint statement, Congress’s top Republican tax writers, Senate Finance Committee Republican Leader Mike Crapo (R-Idaho) and House Committee on Ways and Means Republican Leader Representative Kevin Brady (R-Texas), blasted the Biden Administration’s announcement that it had reached an agreement with the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development:

“Rather than securing an agreement that would provide certainty and immediately eliminate digital services taxes, the Administration has instead used this global forum to advance its short-sighted domestic tax agenda. 

“By doing so, the Biden Administration is putting politics over progress and surrendering the fate of the U.S. economy to our foreign competitors. 

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Job-Killing Tax Hikes Will Hurt Middle Class, Help China

U.S. Senator Mike Crapo (R-Idaho), Ranking Member of the Senate Finance Committee, delivered remarks on the Senate Floor on the Democrats’ $3.5 trillion reckless tax-and-spending bill.  In his speech, Crapo says the efforts to reimagine America by imposing crippling tax hikes will stunt our economic recovery, further impede labor markets, and punish low-and-middle-income workers with higher prices for everyday goods and services.

On business tax hikes:  

A higher corporate tax rate would result in lower wages and reduced benefits; hit the nest eggs of everyone saving for retirement; and force consumers to pay more for everyday necessities. 

Hiking the rate indisputably hits the middle class.  Estimates suggest workers shoulder up to 70 percent of the corporate tax burden.   

And a recent analysis performed by the nonpartisan Joint Committee on Taxation says the burden on over 98 percent of Americans who make less than $500,000 a year increases over time.  Let me make that clear: 98 percent of the increase that is felt by labor, falls on those making less than $500,000 per year, and the vast majority of that on those making less than $400,000 per year.   

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