Bipartisan Policy Center (BPC) Tax Reform Plan Recommendation

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The Bipartisan Policy Center (BPC) Tax Reform bill is a comprehensive plan that reduces tax expenditures and raises revenue. This memorandum will discuss America’s current fiscal challenge and the role of tax reform, outline the major components of the BPC Tax Reform Plan, list advantages and disadvantages of the plan for your constituents, and make a voting recommendation. While the BPC tax reform bill does provide a model for comprehensive tax reform through spending cuts, the overall increase in revenue, especially the implementation of a value-added tax (VAT), is untenable. Vote “no” to the BPC Tax Reform Plan.

The Fiscal Challenge and Tax Reform

America is the most prosperous, resilient nation in the world. American prosperity has provided economic freedom that has enhanced our position in the global market and strengthened our national security. However, American prosperity is not guaranteed. America simultaneously faces two major fiscal challenges, economic recovery and an unsustainable debt.

America’s fiscal challenges are intertwined. America has been slow to recover from the recession that left millions of Americans unemployed, devastated home values, and closed businesses. However, even if America recovered from the recession, the debt will grow exponentially larger than the economy under existing policy. The explosion of federal spending has led to a record setting $17 trillion debt today. This debt will quickly grow to unsustainable levels as a result of the aging population, rapidly increasing health care costs, growing interest cost, and continued unchecked federal spending.

Failure to control the debt will ensure our economic recovery will fail. Growing debt will force the nation to borro...

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...ary, How It Works. Hill and Wang.

Joyce, P. 2011. The Congressional Budget Office: Honest Numbers, Power and Policymaking. Washington, DC: Georgetown University Press.

Matthews, D. 2012 “Are political parties growing more unified?” Retrieved from http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2012/09/06/are-political-parties-growing-more-unified/.

Tax Policy Center. 2010. “Bipartisan Policy Center Tax Reform Proposal.” Retrieved from http://www.taxpolicycenter.org/taxtopics/BPC_Plan.cfm.

Tax Policy Center. 2010. “Restoring America’s Future.” Retrieved from http://bipartisanpolicy.org/sites/default/files/BPC%20FINAL%20REPORT%20FOR%20PRINTER%2002%2028%2011.pdf.

Toder, E. 2012. “Distribution Estimates for Bipartisan Policy Center Tax Reform Proposal.” Retrieved from http://www.taxpolicycenter.org/taxtopics/Distribution-Estimates-for-BPC-Proposal.cfm.

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