Yellen Offers Little Insight on Administration’s Post-TCJA Plan

Department of the Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen offered members of the House Ways and Means Committee limited insight as to how the Biden Administration will handle the provisions of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act that are expiring in 2025.

Speaking during an April 30, 2024, hearing, Yellen offered a common retort when pressed about any of the expiring tax cuts – that it is the administration’s position that there will be no new taxes for taxpayers making under $400,000 per year.

“President Biden has said he would oppose allowing tax cuts to expire for people making under $400,000,” Yellen testified, but did not qualify that comment with specific provisions that he wants to see extended, other than to simply say that there “will be a negotiation over what to do when these tax cuts expire. And the President, as he does in many other situations, will negotiate with Congress.”

She reiterated the principles that will guide future negotiations – the repeatedly stated opposition to anything that raises taxes for those making less than $400,000 and ensuring that the wealthy and large corporations are paying their fair share. She also highlighted that the Biden in his most recent budget proposal is pushing to expand the Child Tax Credit.

Yellen also defended negotiations as part of the OECD from challenges by GOP members of the committee, arguing that the “pillar two agreement that’s been reached is very much in support of goals that are good for this country.”

She also touched on the Direct File pilot, repeating recent remarks from Internal Revenue Service Commissioner Daniel Werfel that while the pilot is initially being looked at as successful, the final decision on whether to proceed with it has not been made.

By Gregory Twachtman, Washington News Editor