East Idaho Times

U.S. Finance Committee Chairman Mike Crapo recently discussed the ongoing efforts to make President Trump's 2017 tax cuts permanent during an appearance on Fox Business with Larry Kudlow. Crapo expressed concerns about a potential $4 trillion tax hike for American taxpayers if these cuts are not made permanent.

Kudlow questioned the difference between a $4 trillion tax hike and $4 trillion in deficit spending, highlighting skepticism towards the Congressional Budget Office and Joint Tax Committee's assessments. He stated, “The 2017 tax cuts—they have now paid for themselves. They unfortunately paid for a lot of other things, bad spending, things.”

Crapo argued that extending current policy should not be seen as increasing the deficit: “If you're not changing the tax code, you're simply extending current policy—you are not increasing the deficit. The bottom line here is that it's a $4.3 trillion tax increase, not a $4.3 trillion deficit increase.”

Addressing what he termed Washington’s "tax-and-spend problem," Crapo emphasized that new taxes would likely lead to increased government spending: “That's exactly right, and let's not be fooled by this—if we had a $4.3 trillion tax increase, Congress would use it on new spending.”

Both Kudlow and Crapo criticized how government fiscal policies are evaluated, suggesting they favor long-term government spending over taxpayer retention of earnings.