FACT CHECK: Mike Pence Continues to Mislead Americans About the Trump Tax Law
June 15, 2018
Mike Pence previewed his stop in Columbus this afternoon with the same falsehoods and misleading claims the White House has been peddling since the passage of the Trump tax law. The DNC has conveniently fact checked them for you.
CLAIM: “All told, under our tax cuts and reforms, the typical Ohio family of four will get to keep nearly $2,300 more of their hard-earned money every year.”
REALITY: Ohio’s working families would not get a significant benefit from the GOP tax law. In fact, many Ohioans could see their taxes increase.
Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy: Under the GOP tax law, Ohioans making less than $84,000 will face an average tax increase by 2027.
CLAIM: “But this is just the beginning because as the economy continues to grow as a result of our tax cuts, our administration estimates that annual wages for Ohio workers will rise by about $4,000 in the years ahead.”
REALITY: Real hourly wages have not increased at all since the GOP tax law passed. Analysts project that corporations will only share a very small portion of their tax windfall with workers.
Washington Post: “The tax bill, which Trump promised would serve as ‘rocket fuel’ for the economy, hasn’t led to any liftoff whatsoever in real average hourly earnings. Since December, the number hasn’t gone up; year over year, it hasn’t gone up.”
New York Times: “The new corporate tax cuts are unlikely to stimulate the level of job creation and wage growth that the Trump administration has promised, a trio of prominent economists has concluded, because high tax rates were not pushing much investment out of the United States in the first place.”
Vox: “A Morgan Stanley survey found that analysts estimate 43 percent of tax cut savings will go to stock buybacks and dividends, while 13 percent will go to pay raises, bonuses, and employee benefits.”
Politifact: “Why You Should Be Skeptical Of The Trump White House’s Promised $4,000 ‘Raise”
CLAIM: “The unemployment rate in Ohio’s capital city has fallen to its lowest level since 2001, and across the state Buckeye businesses have created nearly 74,000 jobs — including more than 9,000 good-paying manufacturing jobs.”
REALITY: Ohio lags behind the national average in job creation, which hasn’t picked up since the GOP tax cut.
WHIO TV: “Again, Ohio’s jobless rate remains higher than the nation’s. The U.S. unemployment rate for May was 3.8 percent, down from 3.9 percent in April, and down from 4.3 percent in May 2017.”
PolitiFact: “Job growth in the past five months is in line with the gains seen in previous five-month periods and in previous January-to-May periods going back nine years.”
CLAIM: “In fact in just the past six months, more than 95,200 Ohio workers have benefited from our tax cuts in the form of pay raises, better benefits and bonuses.”
REALITY: 146,000 Ohio workers got a pay raise from a minimum wage increase this year, and more than a million would benefit from a $15 minimum wage.
Fremont New Messenger: “About 146,000 Ohio workers will get a bump in pay this month as the state minimum wage rises 15 cents, from $8.15 per hour to $8.30… The adjustment, put in place in the 2006 minimum wage ballot initiative, will generate more than $106 million in additional wages.”
Policy Matters Ohio: “Raising the minimum wage to $15 by 2025 would mean a raise for 1.8 million Ohio workers.”