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My cousin informed me in a text that he would owe money because of the GOP's Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA). This surprised him. He has a pretty middle-class income (around $70,000), and so thought some of the tax cut would at least reach him and the many others who are like him. This seems not to be the case. He is now under the impression you have to go much, much higher up the income ladder to reach the levels where the benefits of TCJA are at least visible.

My zeki (cousin) wrote:

When you do your taxes, you will receive a "Tax Cuts and Jobs Act" form that will calculate your tax returns as if the GOP tax cuts were ineffect....Guess what I got, a tax increase of $99...So, lose a Costco membership. Fuck Paul Ryan. No wonder he quit.


For those who might have forgotten, back in February, the now-departing House Speaker Paul Ryan tweeted that a $1.50 increase in the weekly pay of an upstanding Pennsylvania woman was a great thing because it would "more than cover her Costco membership for the year." The tweet was not long for this world. Ryan soon removed it from his account. But its ghost haunted him for a good week or so.

Ryan also promised that ordinary middle-class people like my cousin would get at least $4,000 from the big tax cut. But this money was not coming to your check directly. It wasn't being zapped into your purse or pocket. It was supposed to trickle down to you. As Nick Hanauer pointed out in an excellent piece, "That $4,000 raise Donald Trump and Paul Ryan promised you was a trickle-down lie," there was no reason your boss would, after his/her company received a tax break, pass some of the savings to you.

Hanauer writes:

...Businesses don’t give raises because they can. Businesses give raises when they have to. They give raises when they fear losing employees to a competitor, or when the government requires them to through minimum wage laws.

Why bend over backwards to give people money when it can be done simply and directly—in short, efficiently? This bending business should worry you. When someone resorts to contortion to hand you money, it only means they do not want to pay you.