Tax Day Update: Americans Still Not Seeing Tax Cut Benefit

WASHINGTON, D.C. -- As Americans file their 2018 income taxes, they are now able to evaluate whether they benefited from the sweeping Republican-sponsored tax overhaul, the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, which President Donald Trump signed into law in December 2017. The president touted the legislation, which included tax cuts for individuals and businesses, as a gift to middle-income people. So far, Americans are unconvinced.

As Tax Day approaches, here are updates to five of the questions Gallup measures on taxes.

1. Americans continue to have net-negative views of the 2017 tax bill -- 49% disapprove and 40% approve. Since Gallup began measuring reaction to the law before its passage, approval has ranged from 29% to the current 40%.

   The legislation passed without a single Democratic vote in either chamber of Congress, and Americans' views of it are similarly divided along party lines. Democrats' approval of the law is 16% and Republicans' is 78%. Independents' approval stands at 32%.

   

2. The plurality of Americans, currently 43%, remain unsure whether the new tax law has affected what they pay in federal income taxes, although this is down from 55% a year ago. Meanwhile, 21% now say their taxes have increased as a result, up from 9% who said this in 2018. Another 21%, similar to the 17% from a year ago, say their taxes are unchanged.
   
   Given how politicized the tax cuts were when they were passed, differences in the readings of political partisans might be expected. While there are some differences by party (28% of Democrats, 22% of independents and 13% of Republicans say their taxes have gone up), pluralities of each group still say they are unsure of the effect.

   	April 2018	April 2019
   	%	%
   All adults
   Go up	9	21
   Go down	18	14
   Stay the same	17	21
   Unsure/No answer	55	43
   Republicans
   Go up	6	13
   Go down	28	22
   Stay the same	22	25
   Unsure	43	40
   Independents
   Go up	11	22
   Go down	13	10
   Stay the same	14	20
   Unsure	62	45
   Democrats
   Go up	10	28
   Go down	17	12
   Stay the same	16	17
   Unsure	56	42
   Gallup

3. For the second year in a row, a record-low 45% of Americans say the amount of federal income tax they pay is too high, and 48% say it is about right. Gallup first asked this question in 1956 and from then until 2001, with a couple of exceptions, majorities consistently said their taxes were too high. Since then -- after three rounds of tax cuts in 2001, 2003 and 2017 -- closer to 50% have been content with what they pay.

   

4. A 57% majority of U.S. adults regard the income tax they have to pay as fair, while 39% think it is unfair. Americans' views of the fairness of the taxes they pay have fluctuated over the years, with fewer generally regarding them as fair in years when a Democratic president is in office and more doing so in years when there is a Republican president. There is little variation in Americans' current views by household income or party identification.

   

5. Majorities of Americans continue to think that upper-income people (62%) and corporations (69%) pay too little in taxes, but views are mixed about the tax burden of lower- and middle-income people. Less than half of U.S. adults (48%) now say middle-income people pay their fair share and 43% say they pay too much. Meanwhile, 48% think lower-income people pay too much and 33% think they pay their fair share. The readings on upper-income people and corporations have not varied greatly since George W. Bush's presidency.
   
   Democrats are more likely than Republicans to believe lower- and middle-income people pay too much in taxes and that upper-income people and corporations pay too little. Republicans are more likely to say each group pays their fair share.

   	All adults	Republicans	Independents	Democrats
   	%	%	%	%
   Lower-income people
   Fair share	33	44	32	26
   Too much	48	24	52	64
   Too little	17	30	14	9
   No opinion	2	1	2	1
   Middle-income people
   Fair share	48	58	49	41
   Too much	43	37	42	50
   Too little	7	5	7	8
   No opinion	2	1	2	2
   Upper-income people
   Fair share	27	48	23	14
   Too much	9	15	8	5
   Too little	62	36	66	79
   No opinion	2	2	2	1
   Corporations
   Fair share	23	44	19	12
   Too much	6	9	6	4
   Too little	69	46	73	84
   No opinion	2	2	2	1
   Gallup, April 1-9, 2019

Bottom Line

With Tax Day almost here, support for the 2017 tax overhaul that Trump hailed as an "economic miracle" is steady at its high point, but more still view it negatively than positively. Americans seem to have made up their minds about the law one year ago. If the law is lowering their taxes, Americans aren't feeling it. In fact, more think their taxes have increased rather than decreased as a result, but the plurality remain unsure.

If there's any good news in Gallup's tax findings for Trump and the GOP, it is that fewer than half of Americans think their tax bill is too high. This ties last year's record low.

View complete question responses and trends.

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