The tax bill & the targeting of the resistance

[zoogs]

Something I've been thinking about a lot recently about this horrendous new tax bill is, why? For those who don't know, among its many boilerplate trademark Republican travesties of upward wealth redistribution is a provision to multiply the tax burden for doctoral students.

 

PhD students don't pay tuition. Officially they are sponsored for it, and universities can and do say this is a ~$60,000 expense (it certainly is for master's students, who pay their own way). On top of that, PhD students receive stipends. Effectively, they work full time but don't get paid very much, perhaps around $30k/yr while contributing to research and scholarship. One of the many clever ways Paul Ryan and his companions are finding money to pay for things like the private jet tax break is saying, "Hey, wait a minute, let's say PhD students are getting paid their tuition and must be taxed on it." This puts a grad student in the $30k income tax bracket up to the $80k bracket. Where they may have had to pay ~$3k in taxes before, for example, their new tax burden will increase maybe to $12-13k. Keep in mind they're still only earning that roughly $30k, which on its own is not that much to live on. 

 

I don't understand how anyone could even pursue a doctorate -- five to seven years' commitment, or more! -- unless they are independently or previously wealthy, under this new reality. Why on earth would you do this? 

 

There are a couple of strong benefits for the Republican ruling class, however. First, a really large proportion of graduate students in the U.S. are international. I'm not sure how this breaks down to the doctoral students exactly, but in some fields at least the number for grad students overall is as high as 70%. The visa crunch and the uncertainty of being able to stay in the US after schooling has already driven bright international students elsewhere for graduate studies. Higher education is one of the ways the US brings in immigration. Putting the clamps down is going to be a very effective means of reshaping the cultural makeup of America in the long term. Read this no other way than 'make America white again'.

 

Second, people with high levels of education oppose Republicans at extremely high rates, and that extends beyond simple questions of scientific literacy. You don't really even need a graduate degree, really, to see these effects, but attacking graduate education is also just one part of attacking education in general. The other, simultaneous prongs of this include "charter schools", "for-profit colleges are just as good", etc. Every authoritarian, autocratic regime in history has gone after the intelligentsia, because these are the people who don't put up with their bulls#!t. Mao's Cultural Revolution won't fly in America -- I think -- but depressing interest in/ability to pursue higher education is going to be an invisible, imperceptible way to accomplish these things. Reshape the electorate to be less literate, less diverse, and more in hock to the corporate oligarchy which will continue to do very well. 

 

We can't accept this. And yet, I fear we will.

[Danny Bateman]

I've read several accounts of people who either are or in doctoral programs who fear they're just straight up not going to be able to financially swing continuing their education if this bill goes through due out what zoogs described. Their tuition was previously tax exempt, now it will not be. All so we can make permanent cuts for corporations, give more back to wealthy folks & give Trump deductions for his private jets and golf courses.

 

Also, there's another way you could frame this as "targeting the resistance," as it were.

 

The Senate bill currently repeals state and local tax (SALT) deductions. These are used by people in places with high local & state taxes - which happens to be almost exclusively blue states - to write off what they pay already paid on their federal taxes.

 

Repealing this is going to dramatically shift the tax burden on citizens of those blue states. They're going to see tax hikes. It's why already vulnerable GOP house members in places like CA, NY or NJ who voted yes on this bill are committing political suicide. Their constituents already pay very high taxes, and they're putting their name on a bill that will raise them further. If you're a Republicna in a blue state and you vote for a tax increase, why are you even there? 

 

Regardless, a tax bill structured like this essentially forces blue staters to subsidize large cuts for the rest of the country. This is a bit like a reverse ACA effect, as conservatives complained that it disproportionately favored blue states at the expense of red ones. They key difference is that red states could've accepted their benefits at any time - they chose to obstinately chose to dig their heels in and refuse them, because... Obama. High tax blue states have no such option to avoid the hammer of this tax bill.

 

The fact that it targets them is a feature, not a bug.

 

Here's an article providing a bit more background if you're interested: http://thehill.com/opinion/finance/360636-new-yorkers-have-a-right-to-be-salty-over-salt-reform

 

 

[zoogs]