One solution would be for Congress to pass a one-time 50% tax on all tariff refunds received by companies. The money would be used to cut income taxes or to fund additional Trump account contributions.
Stephen Moore: Unleash Prosperity Hotline – This issue is what used to be called a sticky wicket.
The Supreme Court has ordered that illegally imposed Trump tariff/tax revenues collected by the federal government must be refunded to those who paid the bill. Some $100 billion has been cleared for refunds with as much $70 billion more on the way. The law requires that the companies that have receipts proving they paid the taxes receive the refunds.
But consumers argue that the shoppers who bought the products bore some of the cost of the tariffs in higher prices. No one knows exactly what that number is, but Goldman Sachs estimated it at 55% and the Congressional Budget Office has it at 70%.
Let's take a back-of-the-envelope estimate of 50%. This means that if businesses pocket all the $100 billion they effectively receive a $50 billion windfall.
Here are some preliminary estimates of the tariff refunds to corporate America already:
- Walmart: $2.4 billion refund
- Apple: $2.2 billion refund
- Costco: $2 billion refund
- Target: $2 billion refund
- Ford: $1.3 billion refund
- Amazon: $600 million refund
If so, this will cause a hurricane of opposition and indignation from consumers - who have already been paying the higher grocery and energy bill for the inflation of the last several years.
One solution would be for Congress to pass a one-time 50% tax on all tariff refunds received by companies. All the money would be used to cut income taxes or to fund additional Trump account contributions.
