A Tax Hike or Benefit for the ‘Middle Class’?

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi claimed that the Republican tax cut plan “raises taxes on [the] middle class,” while President Donald Trump claimed that “everybody’s gonna benefit” from a plan that “is for the middle class.”

Which is it? Some in the “middle class” — however we might define that — would see higher taxes, but others would see a tax cut, according to an analysis of the GOP framework by the Tax Policy Center. The president is wrong to say everybody would benefit, while Pelosi ignores that most taxpayers in the group she considers the “middle class” would see a tax cut.

The president also said that the tax plan “ensures that the benefits of tax reform go to the middle class, not to the highest earners,” but the Tax Policy Center analysis found most of the benefits of the tax cut go to the top 1 percent.

The White House and GOP congressional leaders released the framework of their tax plan on Sept. 27.

The plan would cut the corporate tax rate from 35 percent to 20 percent; abolish the alternative minimum tax; collapse the seven income tax brackets, ranging from , to three (12 percent,