I think there is a reasonable chance of another tax cut late this year or the first half of next year. The economy needs to continue doing well for Trump to retain power so I am expecting another cut. I think a tax cut and continued economic performance is just as likely as a recession. Any other opinions?
The President did confirm that a temporary payroll tax cut and capital gains indexing are on the table. However, there are no budget resolutions from the chambers that have been reconciled in a budget conference. The Senate Budget Committee approved a budget resolution in March that assumes spending caps remain at their statutory levels while allowing them to be adjusted if an agreement is reached. The Democratic-led House on the other hand has moved forward with an alternate "deeming" resolution that sets their 302(a) allocation higher than the statutory spending caps. The House has also moved forward with 302(b) allocations. The Senate wants an agreement first. The President will need to play the middle and neither party wants a government shutdown or even a rough spot right before an election. Therefore, I think he's just putting tax cuts on the table to gain some cost-cutting concessions for the FY2020 budget and to give him some room to maneuver. As an aside, the 2020 fiscal year begins October 1st. But its been many years since the Congress has been able to get a budget by October 1st resulting in the need for continuing resolutions until they can get it done, which often extends into the following spring.
I don’t think there will be a recession unless it’s fabricated like it was in 2008. If it was up to the senate, there would be a tax cut, but I don’t think the democrats want to do anything that’ll help Trump get re-elected so it might not happen. Just opinion. As everyone knows, back room deals take place in DC all the time, so time will tell.
I've considered Democrats blocking a tax cut but I don't think that will happen, based on them being Democrats. They have to be the most ineffectual group since the OJ Simpson jury. I don't know any Democrats who think they are represented even reasonably well. It wouldn't take much to swing Democrats to vote for a small to medium tax cut. Republicans can offer to shut down the concentration camps at the border, write a blank check, and then not bother closing the camps. So, I think a tax cut is a possibility.
Speaking as a progressive democrat, you are correct. I do not consider myself represented even reasonably well @TomB16
I just re-read post #4 and it sounds like pithy sarcasm. It is not. I stand behind everything in that post. A possible tax cut is one of the reasons I remain in the market, even when there is so much talk of recession.
Yo, record deficits! Where's the Tea Party at??!?! *crickets If I was Trump I would do everything possible to create a sugar high here for the economy, screw trillion dollar deficits, let the next Democrat in office deal with it.
One of the reasons we have dramatically slowed our reinvestment is because of the sugar high situation. I'm operating on the theory that, sooner or later, the books will need to be either balanced or nearly so (debt will need to expand at the rate of inflation or less). When that day comes, I expect a financial reckoning. My confidence in this obvious reality is limited, however. It would seem we can run heavy deficits for decades without problem or repercussion.
That is not completely true. Lets drop political preferences and simply look at the numbers: Clinton balanced the budget right into a surplus, but keep in mind that he caught the tech bubble and the booming markets helped. Still, he handed off to Bush near balanced. Bush got into a war, so that is expensive. He was looking good towards the end, but then the financial crisis hit. The financial crisis was not a result of any sort of tax cuts, but rather a previous decade of deregulations. I would not say that Bush took actions to kick the can down the road to Obama, there is nothing at all Bush could have done to prevent the 2008 financial crisis at its final stages. He handed off a financial crisis in 2008 to Obama who needed $800B to save the banks. Thats the big 2009 line. Since that 2009 low, Obama managed to get the deficit reduced again, that upward trend is clearly visible, but that trend changed in 2016 with Trump. To claim that Clinton handed Bush a big deficit is not true Bush was saddled with a war to pay for. To claim that Obama handed Trump an economy with booming deficits is not true because from everything I see, Trump keeps telling us how the economy is in amazing shape which should mean deficit spending can be balanced. We should not be claiming "both sides" argument and pretending that what ever party we most align with can do no wrong. All we should be looking at is the actual numbers.
I didn't bring up the deficit, you did. It was funny till you got serious. Here's the real truth about deficits. They keep growing....I'm not worried about the deficit at all. Most types of federal spending have grown steadily since 1962 https://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/article/2018/nov/02/five-charts-about-debt/
Well yes, I brought up the deficit in my first response, so it was me that brought it up. Nothing wrong with what you linked there, its all good, but the initial topic was getting further tax cuts. The last batch of tax cuts were a bust for me and my family. We ended up paying more, so no celebrations there. I know voters love hearing about how they are going to get a tax cut if they vote for somebody, but come on now, thats all bullshit and they need to stop voting based off stupid promises like that.
I pay a LOT less in taxes now. As far as promising people shit, that's every politician, in every country since the dawn of time...that'll never change.
Seriously though, my freinds and family are about 50/50 on savings for the new tax rate. Most of the ones who cheated every year are the ones with the most complaining....lol
It seems to me, the best way to argue about politics is with money. I thought the economy would implode under Trump. I sold all of my S&P 500 before the election (it was about 15% of our portfolio), thinking I would re-purchase if Hillary won. We've done extremely well since Trump took office; substantially better than if we held S&P 500, but I was dead wrong about the economic implications. I did not expect great economic output during the Obama era, either. That worked out well. I was pretty confident things would implode under Bush, and that was dead on. We moved heavily into real estate in late 2007. Where we live, the R-E market did well during 2008/2009/2010. Our R-E market didn't cool off until 2015. Investing is about objectivity. There is something healthy about considering potential events and the potential outcomes they might trigger, with zero regard to my own philosophical positions. Certainly, I vote my conscience but that has nothing at all to do with how I invest our money.
