Team Trump’s New Pledge on Tax Cuts

David Leonhardt:

Team Trump’s New Pledge on Tax Cuts: ...Last week..., Steven Mnuchin said something unexpected on CNBC in his first interview after becoming Donald Trump’s choice for Treasury secretary. A friendly host invited Mnuchin to respond to the liberal charge that Trump’s tax cut was a sop to the rich. Mnuchin, a financier and former Goldman Sachs partner, refused — and made news instead.

“It’s not the case at all,” he said. “Any reductions we have in upper-income taxes will be offset by less deductions, so that there will be no absolute tax cut for the upper class. There will be a big tax cut for the middle class, but any tax cuts we have for the upper class will be offset by less deductions that pay for it.” ...

Of course, a single comment from Trump’s orbit — even from the captain of the economic team, who repeated it for emphasis — deserves skepticism. ...

Most Americans oppose a tax cut for the rich, polls indicate. History shows that the economic rationale is nonsense, which means it would not help the working-class voters who elected Trump. And the incoming president’s own Treasury secretary said it would not happen: “There will be no absolute tax cut for the upper class.”

It’s a simple, yes-or-no standard. Call it the Mnuchian standard. Any plan that cuts taxes for the rich falls short and deserves to fail.