A Better Way

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A Better Way was a conservative agenda for U.S. governance, crafted by former Speaker of the House Paul Ryan as well as Kevin Brady, former chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee. [1] [2] [3] Ryan called the six-point plan "a complete alternative to the Left's agenda". [4] Shortly after the 2016 United States elections, Speaker Ryan said that the plan, described by Reuters as an "aggressive Republican legislative agenda", provides a blueprint for laws he expected to spearhead in the Republican congress in cooperation with the Republican Trump administration. [5] For someone other than the party's nominee to direct the party's agenda in a presidential election year was termed "a rare move". [6]

Contents

Six-point plan

The plan covers six points: Poverty, National Security, Economy, Constitution, Health Care, and Tax Reform. [7] The points in the plan, which Speaker Ryan intended to press forward in the 2017-2018 115th Congress, had been described as "mostly ignor[ing] the areas where Trump's agenda clash with tenets of conservative doctrine" such as trade policy, immigration reform and entitlement cuts. [8] It did not cover some points that were major issues in the presidential campaign, such as a border wall with Mexico and banning immigrants who are Muslims. [9]

  1. Poverty
    Proponents of the plan believe that welfare reform can address systemic problems of poverty in America. Critics say the plan will "cut the social safety net". [10]
  2. National Security
    The national security plan contains four sub-points: "defeat the terrorists," "protect the homeland," "tackle new threats" and "defend freedom". It further addresses border security with a plan to "accelerate the deployment of fencing, technology, air assets, and personnel at the border". [11] The plan was said to "push back" on Trump's "America First" agenda enunciated during the presidential campaign. [12]
  3. U.S. economy
  4. Constitutional rule
    The constitution plan contains four sub-points: stopping executive overreach, reining in regulators, imposing new limits on spending, and increasing transparency [13]
  5. Healthcare
    House Republicans plan to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act ("Obamacare")[ citation needed ]
  6. Tax reform
    A number of proposed changes to the United States tax code have been announced by the United States House Committee on Ways and Means. [14] The proposal would reduce the federal corporate tax rate from 35 percent to 20 percent as well as repealing the corporate alternative minimum tax (“AMT”). [15] Depreciation rules would be replaced with expensing new investment in equipment, structures, and intellectual property. Depreciation or expensing deduction would not be allowed for land, and inventories would be subject to last-in-first-out (LIFO) accounting. In addition, the deductibility of net interest expense would be eliminated. [15] Additionally, corporate tax would be "border adjusted", which would mean that exports would be exempt from the tax and imports subject to it. [15]

Border adjustment

One of the largest revenue increasing proposals of the plan is reform of corporate tax which is "border adjusted." This would mean that exports would be exempt from tax and imports would be subject to it. The Economist and others note that this may fall foul of World Trade Organization (WTO) rules. [16] [17] Bloomberg View noted that the proposed tax would favour domestically produced goods as they would be taxed less than imports, to a degree varying across sectors. For example, the wage component of the cost of domestically produced goods would not be taxed. [17] Because the United States imports more than it exports, border adjustability would raise $1.2trn over a decade, covering almost two-thirds of the cost of cutting the tax rate to 20%, according to the Tax Policy Centre. [16]

On January 16, Donald Trump commented that a border adjustment tax would be "too complicated" in a Wall Street Journal article. [18] White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer stated on January 26 said that the proposal was "one idea" of the administration in regards to tax policy. [19]

Proposed

Results

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References

  1. ↑ Ellen Carmichael (June 13, 2016), "Conservatism's Little Red Hen Moment: Speaker Ryan's 'A Better Way' proposals are the conservative-reform agenda of the future.", National Review
  2. ↑ James Pethokoukis (November 10, 2016), "Can Donald Trump and Paul Ryan share the GOP?", The Week
  3. ↑ Lohr, Steve (2016-12-12). "New Approach to Corporate Tax Law Has House G.O.P. Support". The New York Times. ISSN   0362-4331 . Retrieved 2016-12-23.
  4. ↑ Mike DeBonis (December 3, 2015), "In address, Paul Ryan pledges a 'complete alternative' to the Democratic agenda", The Washington Post
  5. ↑ David Morgan (November 9, 2016), Speaker Ryan pledges to work with Trump on bold agenda, Reuters
  6. ↑ Mike DeBonis; Kelsey Snell (June 22, 2016), "Ryan rolls out policy agenda House Republicans can use in November", The Washington Post
  7. ↑ Ian Tuttle (August 24, 2016), "The Great Ignored Agenda", National Review
  8. ↑ Mike DeBonis (November 15, 2016), "Paul Ryan is set to remain as House speaker, and so are GOP tensions", The Washington Post– via Chicago Tribune
  9. ↑ Russell Berman (November 14, 2016), "Paul Ryan's Gamble: After months of keeping his distance without repudiating his nominee, the House speaker embraced Trump just in time to see his bet pay off", The Atlantic
  10. ↑ Alex Morash (June 8, 2016), Ryan's "Better Way" Poverty Plan Is Based On Myths From Right-Wing Media, Media Matters for America
  11. ↑ John Bat (June 9, 2016), "Paul Ryan releases national security plan", CBS News
  12. ↑ Russell Berman (June 10, 2016), "House Republicans Push Back on Trump's Foreign Policy: GOP leaders have crafted an agenda that bears little resemblance to their presidential candidate's stated vision", The Atlantic
  13. ↑ A Better Way to Do the People's Business: By the Numbers (PDF), U.S. Speaker of the House, archived from the original (PDF) on 2016-11-09, retrieved 2016-11-16
  14. ↑ House Republicans Unveil 21st Century Tax Plan Built for Growth, United States House Committee on Ways and Means, June 4, 2016, archived from the original on November 17, 2016, retrieved November 16, 2016
  15. 1 2 3 Brill, Alex (October 2016). "Tax Reform: Ryan-Brady Plan Is a Better Way" (PDF). Retrieved 2016-12-23.
  16. 1 2 "Republican plans to cut corporate taxes may have unpleasant side-effects". The Economist. 17 December 2016. Retrieved 2016-12-23.
  17. 1 2 Freund, Caroline (18 January 2017). "Trump Is Right: 'Border Adjustment' Tax Is Complicated". BloombergView. Bloomberg LP. Retrieved 19 January 2017.
  18. ↑ Rubin, Richard; Nicholas, Peter (2017-01-17). "Donald Trump Warns on House Republican Tax Plan". Wall Street Journal. ISSN   0099-9660 . Retrieved 2017-01-27.
  19. ↑ Appelbaum, Michael D. Shear, Binyamin; Rappeport, Alan (2017-01-26). "White House Sows Confusion About Plan for a 20% Import Tax". The New York Times. ISSN   0362-4331 . Retrieved 2017-01-27.
  20. ↑ Kaplan, Thomas. "House Passes Measure to Repeal and Replace the Affordable Care Act". NY Times. Retrieved May 4, 2017.
  21. ↑ Roll call vote 256 , via Clerk.House.gov
  22. ↑ "Office of the Clerk of the U.S. House of Representatives". June 8, 2017. Retrieved June 10, 2017.
  23. ↑ Roll call vote 299 , via Clerk.House.gov
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