Congressional Body Finds Tax Changes in Coronavirus Bill Overwhelmingly Benefits Millionaires

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A nonpartisan Congressional body has found that a tax change included in Congress’s coronavirus relief legislation overwhelmingly benefits those who make more than $1 million annually.

Senate Republicans had introduced a provision that “suspends a limitation on how much owners of businesses formed as ‘pass-through’ entities can deduct against their nonbusiness income, such as capital gains, to reduce their tax liability,” according to The Washington Post.

The Joint Committee on Taxation (JCT), the nonpartisan congressional body, found that taxpayers will shoulder the cost of suspending the limitation to the amount of $90 million in 2020 alone. More than 80 percent of the benefits go to about 43,000 taxpayers who make over $1 million annually, with less than three percent going to Americans who make less than $100,000 annually.

Senator Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.) and Representative Lloyd Doggett (D-Tex.) requested the JCT analysis.

“It’s a scandal for Republicans to loot American taxpayers in the midst of an economic and human tragedy,” the two lawmakers said in a statement. “Congress should repeal this rotten, un-American giveaway and use the revenue to help workers battling through this crisis.”

Millions of Americans who qualified for the $1,200 payment should start receiving their stimulus checks as part of the $2.2. trillion CARES Act this week.