Congress’ official budget office said Sunday an analysis of how the senate Republican tax bill would affect the American economy isn’t available yet, even as the GOP hopes to vote on the bill this week.
The congressional budget office published an analysis of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act finding it would add roughly $1.4 trillion to federal deficits over a decade, in line with earlier estimates of the bill’s cost produced as it moved through committee earlier this month, CBS reported.
A macroeconomic score of the bill would provide a benchmark for a key claim of the Trump administration and congressional Republicans—that the tax overhaul will partly or wholly pay for itself by stoking faster economic growth.
Some senate Republicans, such as Senator Bob Corker of Tennessee, have said they will not vote for the bill unless credible analysis suggests it won’t add to the deficit, once the possibility of faster economic growth is taken into account.
Sunday’s report noted it is “not practicable” yet to produce an estimate of the bill that includes its macroeconomic effects. The experts that would produce such an analysis, the nonpartisan joint committee on taxation, haven’t had enough time to work through it.
It could be weeks before such a dynamic analysis might be available. The joint committee on taxation has yet to produce one for the house version of the tax bill, which passed on Nov. 16.
The senate budget committee is scheduled to take up the tax bill on Tuesday, a preliminary step before it heads to the floor.
