GOP tax bill hands biggest benefits to top earners, study says

The final Republican tax bill would lower taxes on average across the income spectrum for the first eight years, with the largest benefits going to upper earners, according to a new analysis Monday by the Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center.

Next year, the average federal tax cut would be $1,610, the study found. The bottom fifth of income-earners would get an average cut of $60 and those in the middle fifth would get a $930 cut on average, according to the analysis. The top 1 percent would get $51,140 on average, and the top 0.1 percent would get $193,380, it found.

President Donald Trump has said the tax plan’s biggest beneficiaries will be middle-income families, and the wealthiest Americans won’t gain from it.

In 2025, the average tax cut would fall to $1,570 on average. Those in the bottom fifth would get a cut of $70 and those in the middle fifth would get a cut of $910, according to the study. The top 1 percent would get $61,090 apiece and the top 0.1 percent would get $252,300, it found.

By 2027, individual breaks that are set to expire would lead to a tax increase for the bottom 60 percent of earners relative to existing law, while those on the higher end -- especially the top 1 percent—would continue to see lower taxes, according to the analysis.

The analysis comes three days after the final legislation was made public and one day before the Republican-led House and aims to vote on it.

Senator Orrin Hatch, a Republican from Utah and chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, left, talks to Steven Mnuchin, U.S. Treasury Secretary, as Gary Cohn, director of the U.S. National Economic Council, right, sits during a meeting with members of the committee on tax reform legislation at the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C., U.S., on Thursday, Nov. 9, 2017. Senate Republicans released their vision for a tax-cut plan Thursday that would cut the corporate tax rate to 20 percent, with a one-year delay to 2019, as Congress moves quickly to fulfill one of the GOPs biggest and most long-awaited goals. Photographer: Andrew Harrer/Bloomber
Senator Orrin Hatch, a Republican from Utah and chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, left, talks to Steven Mnuchin, U.S. Treasury secretary, as Gary Cohn, director of the U.S. National Economic Council, right, sits during a meeting with members of the committee on tax reform legislation at the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C., U.S., on Thursday, Nov. 9, 2017. Senate Republicans released their vision for a tax-cut plan Thursday that would cut the corporate tax rate to 20 percent, with a one-year delay to 2019, as Congress moves quickly to fulfill one of the GOPs biggest and most long-awaited goals. Photographer: Andrew Harrer/Bloomberg
Andrew Harrer/Bloomberg

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