Would Joe Biden Increase Your Taxes?
We have created a web application using the Policy Simulation Library’s open-source Tax-Cruncher that allows users to explore how Biden’s tax plan would impact their federal tax liability.
In our recently updated analysis of Joe Biden’s tax proposals, we found that the Biden plan would raise federal revenue by $2.8 trillion over the next decade. Almost a quarter of that new revenue would come from individual income and payroll tax increases that fall primarily on high-income households.
To supplement our analysis of Biden’s tax proposals, we have created a web application using the Policy Simulation Library’s open-source Tax-Cruncher that allows users to explore how Biden’s tax plan would impact their federal tax liability.
Users can specify demographic information, the number and age of dependents, the level and composition of income, and any itemizable expense that a taxpayer may report. The app then allows you to see how Biden’s individual, payroll, and corporate tax reform proposals would impact different taxpayers under different assumptions. And since the tax code is scheduled to change over the next decade, we also allow you to choose a year between 2021 and 2030 to analyze.
The app provides a detailed breakdown of a given taxpayer’s taxable income, individual income and payroll tax liability, and the value of any tax credits they may qualify for under both current law and Biden’s proposals. It also shows an estimate of the taxpayer’s share of corporate tax liability that falls on their capital income (capital gains, dividends, interest, and business income) and labor income.
For example, the app can explore how Biden’s plan would impact the 2021 tax liability of a joint filer that makes $75,000 in yearly wage income and has two children under six years old (Figure 1). The application shows that Biden’s proposals would zero out our hypothetical taxpayer’s income tax liability and actually provide a net income tax refund of $1,590 for a total income tax reduction of $3,200, net of refundable credits. This taxpayer’s payroll tax liability would remain the same at $11,480, and this taxpayer would face a slight, indirect tax increase of approximately $311 from the corporate income tax.
Figure 1. Basic Tax Liabilities for a Hypothetical Taxpayer, 2021
Current Law | Biden Plan | Change | |
Individual Income Tax | $1,610 | $—1,590 | $—3,200 |
Income Tax Marginal Rate | 12% | 12% | 0% |
Employee + Employer Payroll Tax | $11,480 | $11,480 | $0 |
Payroll Tax Marginal Rate | 15% | 15% | 0% |
Corporate Tax Incidence (Wages) | $218 | $529 | $311 |
Corporate Tax Incidence (Capital) | $0 | $0 | $0 |
Source: Authors’ calculations using the Tax-Cruncher-Biden application.
In addition to tax liability calculations, the application creates a series of interactive charts that allow you to explore how a taxpayer’s average and marginal income and payroll tax rates would change if their earnings (or a different income measure of your choosing) were to vary (as shown in Figure 2). Similarly, the app generates other charts that show how total income and payroll tax liability and credits, such as the Child Tax Credit, Child and Dependent Care Credit, and the Earned Income Tax Credit, would vary by income.
Figure 2. Tax Rates by Taxpayer Earnings, 2021
Source: Authors’ calculations using the Tax-Cruncher-Biden application.
This application allows one to explore many aspects of how Biden’s plan would impact tax liabilities, but no tool is perfect. It excludes some more complex provisions in the tax code to ease useability and does not capture every possible variable. Above all, the app is educational and should not be used for tax preparation purposes.
You can access the web application here.
This article first appeared on AEIdeas, a publication of the American Enterprise Institute.
Image: Reuters.