Business Groups Fear Democrats Will Push for Corporate Tax Hike

Business groups are preparing themselves for a potential corporate tax hike under Democrats.

The Hill reports that Democrats, who will take control of the House in January, could launch proposals to raise corporate taxes.

Both President Donald Trump and Democrats have championed the need to fund infrastructure projects — repairing and upgrading roads, rails, bridges and the like — and the corporate tax rate could provide the means to pay for such improvements.

But while Trump favors infrastructure work, the report says, any rescission of the deep cut to the corporate tax rate passed in 2017 would be a tough, if not impossible, sell. Still, Democrats — even those who favored a reduction in the corporate tax rate — thought Trump’s tax law brought it down too far, from 35% to 21%.

In addition, Congressional Democrats voted unanimously against the law, which they said benefited businesses and wealthy individuals substantially more than the average taxpayer.

But even last year some Senate Democrats suggested increasing in the corporate rate to 25%, as well as ending parts of the tax law that benefit the wealthy, as a means of paying for $1 trillion in infrastructure investments. They said that increase would bring in $359 billion over 10 years.

Businesses, however, are opposed, as is the Republican-controlled Senate. “Talk of repealing any part of the tax reform bill is a nonstarter,” Ed Mortimer, U.S. Chamber of Commerce vice president of transportation and infrastructure, said in a statement in the report.