Donald Trump’s New Ad Reflects Uncertainty in Tax Plan

By RICHARD RUBIN

Aug 29, 2016 

Besides deep tax cuts, what’s in Donald Trump’s tax plan? Mr. Trump hasn’t filled in all the details, and his own campaign ads don’t seem to know.

The Republican candidate released a 30-second spot on Monday that touts his proposed tax cuts and their economic benefits. But the footnotes in the ad cite Mr. Trump’s 2015 tax proposal, which he revised and left incomplete this month, along with a House Republican tax plan that he hasn’t fully embraced.

Last year, as he was running for the Republican nomination, Mr. Trump proposed a tax plan that would reduce federal revenue by about 22% over a decade and push 33 million more households off the income tax rolls.

On Aug. 8, after months of speculation about potential changes to reduce the size of the tax cuts, Mr. Trump gave a speech in Detroit in which he adopted the House Republicans’ individual income tax rates – with a top rate of 33% as opposed to the 25% in his own original plan. He also agreed with their plan to let companies write off capital investments immediately instead of deducting them over time.

But he was silent or opaque on other aspects of his original plan, such as whether he would continue to let individuals with income up to $25,000 and married couples with incomes up to $50,000 fill out a one-page tax form that says “I win’ and pay no income taxes.

He also stuck with business-income tax rates of 15%, below the House GOP plan. And advisers said Mr. Trump was resisting the House GOP’s proposed limits on business interest. He also hasn’t said whether he’s keeping his original proposal on taxing U.S. companies’ foreign income immediately or taking the House approach, which would tax companies based on the location of their sales, not their profits.

In that Detroit speech Mr. Trump also promised more details in the days ahead. Since then, the campaign has explained more about his proposed child-care deduction would work but hasn’t offered a complete plan.

The campaign didn’t respond immediately to a request for comment on Monday.