Kudos to the Senate GOP for defeating the Wyden-Smith plan that was a Democratic policy coup.
by Wall Street Journal Editorial Board, August 1, 2024
The Senate blocked a bipartisan tax measure on Thursday, and the headlines will shout that the GOP denied cash for children in poverty. But Republicans deserve credit for declining to entrench an anti-work entitlement in exchange for popular business tax breaks.
The Senate voted 48-44 not to advance the tax bill negotiated by Oregon Democratic Sen. Ron Wyden and GOP House Ways and Means Chairman Jason Smith. The bill, which passed the House this year, combined the renewal of expiring business tax provisions such as bonus depreciation with an expansion of the $2,000 child tax credit.
The business community lobbied hard for the measure, so all the more notable that GOP Senators noticed they’d been outfoxed by Mr. Wyden. The bill’s changes to the child tax credit are arcane but amount to large cash subsidies to households that owe no income tax. The changes are temporary, but Democrats vow to make this a guaranteed income for parents.
The bill’s changes mean a parent of three could claim $4,800 in cash credits with only about $13,000 of earnings, down from the roughly $34,500 required under the current credit system, according to estimates from the Foundation for Government Accountability.
Democrats have maligned Republicans as indifferent to struggling children, but the GOP can defend steady work as essential to improving a family’s circumstances. The discipline and norms of parents and neighbors who work are crucial to helping children escape poverty, and this is one of the few cultural choices government can influence through the welfare state.
Children fare better economically in the long run if they grow up in communities where the adults around them are employed at high rates. That’s one insight of a new study from Harvard University’s Raj Chetty and his colleagues.
But Democrats refused to revisit the anti-work provisions. Particular credit is due GOP Sens. Mike Crapo (Idaho) and Thom Tillis (North Carolina), whose opposition lent a backbone to Republicans who might otherwise wave through the changes as politically popular with voters and business supporters.
A mere three Republicans supported the bill, as most have concluded the party can drive a harder bargain when the 2017 tax cuts expire next year. Vice President Kamala Harris is promising huge tax increases if she wins, and Donald Trump is so far mostly offering vote-buying sops such as exempting taxes on tips.
Congress will have to rebuild its intellectual muscle memory on taxes, and House Republicans signing onto the child tax credit blowout wasn’t an encouraging sign. Kudos to Senate Republicans for pumping the brakes on this tax blunder.