Despite Trump Tax Cuts, Feds Claiming Record Haul for 2018
Despite passing sweeping individual tax cuts, the federal government collected a record amount of income tax from Americans in fiscal 2018.
According to the Treasury Department’s monthly treasury statement, the federal government collected more than $1.68 trillion in taxes.
The previous record was set in 2015 when the Treasury Department collected roughly $1.63 trillion in individual income taxes.
Additionally, CNS News reports that while the federal government collected a record number of individual income taxes in fiscal 2018, the overall real federal tax revenues were actually lower than in the last three years.
Total tax collection for fiscal 2018 was roughly $3.33 trillion, which was was down from $3.39 trillion collected in fiscal 2017.
The reason for the decline is that while the government was collecting a record amount of individual taxes, it was collecting less in corporate taxes.
The total for corporate taxes for the fiscal year came in at just shy of $205 billion, which is down from the previous fiscal year’s collection of nearly $304 billion.
This is also down from the corporate tax collections of fiscal 2016 ($313 billion) and fiscal 2015 ($365 billion).
Despite the record tax collection, the federal government also ran a deficit of nearly $779 billion for the fiscal year. While the government was collecting a record number of taxes, it spent more than $4.1 trillion.
The deficit contributed to the national debt increasing by more than $1.27 trillion according to CNS News, and is the “sixth largest fiscal-year debt increase in the history of the United States.”
CNS also reports that because there were 155 million people who had jobs in August in the United States, the debt that was accumulated for the year turned out to be approximately $138,330 for every person who has a job.
The record number of taxes collected comes despite the individual tax cuts passed by Congress.
In September, the House voted to make the individual tax cuts permanent in a vote of 220-191. The bill isn’t expected to be voted on in the Senate before the midterm elections.
Ways and Means ranking Democrat Richard Neal said at the time, “Their second round of tax cuts for the wealthy will further compromise the future of Medicare and Social Security.”
He added that bill shows that Republicans “are hardly the party of fiscal rectitude or conservatism.”
However, House Speaker Paul Ryan touted the bill saying that the bill will “help families plan for the future.
Tax reform is working. The American economy and our workforce are thriving. These Tax Reform 2.0 bills make lower rates for individuals and small business permanent, and help families further plan for the future. pic.twitter.com/VepjZI00KA
— Paul Ryan (@SpeakerRyan) September 28, 2018
The fiscal year for the federal government runs from Oct. 1 to Sept. 30.
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