The process continues in D.C. as the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act faces hearings before the House Ways and Means Committee.

On Monday Chairman Brady released a set of amendments, adopted by the Committee, that made the following revisions to the bill.

• Rules mandating proper net earnings from self-employment for earned income tax credit
• Employers must give employees’ name and address on payroll tax returns
• Three year holding period for carried interests to get long term capital gain treatment
• 1.4% excise tax only applies to universities with endowments of more than $250,000 per student
• Deferral up to five years for income from stock options or restricted stock units if corporation’s stock is not publicly traded
• Restores ability to treat self-created musical works as capital assets
• Continue employer exclusion of dependent care assistance of up to $5,000 through 2022

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On September 27, 2017 the “Big Six” released the “Unified Framework for Fixing Our Broken Tax Code” that contained some details on the proposal.  The framework, which runs for 9 pages, is a bit more detailed than earlier statements, but still omits many details necessary to determine the impact of the proposal on specific taxpayers.  The first three pages of the framework contain mainly a vague description of the goals and justifications for the program, with only the final six pages giving actual information about steps to be taken.

By contrast, the initial proposal issued by the Treasury Department during the Reagan Administration that began the process the resulted in the Tax Reform Act of 1986 ran for over 400 pages. 

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A Joint Statement on Tax Reform was released on July 27, 2017 by House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-WI), Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY), Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, National Economic Council Director Gary Cohn, Senate Finance Committee Chairman Orrin Hatch (R-UT), and House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Kevin Brady (R-TX).  The statement provides a very basic outline of the basic ideas that the “Big 6” (a reference to the above group that has cropped up in the tax press) have determined to attempt to include in the tax reform bill that Congress expects to begin work on shortly.

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