Navigating the Uncertainty of Tax Policy and Economic Growth

Our strategists Michael Zezas and Ariana Salvatore provide context around U.S. House Republicans’ proposed tax bill and how investors should view its potential market impact.

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Michael Zezas: Welcome to Thoughts on the Market. I'm Michael Zezas, Global Head of Fixed Income Research and Public Policy Strategy.

Ariana Salvatore: And I'm Ariana Salvatore, Public Policy Strategist.

Michael Zezas: Today, we'll dig into Congress's deliberations on taxes and fiscal spending.

It's Wednesday, May 14th at 10am in New York.

Michael Zezas: So, Ariana, there's been a lot of news around the tax and spending plans that Congress is pursuing; this fiscal package – and clients are really, really focused on it. You're having a lot of those conversations right now. Why are clients so focused on all of this?

Ariana Salvatore: So, clients have reasons to focus on this tax policy bill across equities, fixed income, and for macroeconomic impacts.

Starting with equities, there's a lot of the 2017 tax cut bill that's coming up for expiration towards the end of this year. So, this bill is Congress's chance to extend the expiring TCJA. And add on some incremental tax cuts that President Trump floated on the campaign trail. So, there's some really important sector impacts on the specific legislation side. And then as far as the deficit goes, that matters a lot for the economic ramifications next year and for bond yields.

But Mike, to pivot this back to you, where do you think investor expectations are for the outcome of this package?

Michael Zezas: So there's a lot of moving pieces in this fiscal policy package, and I think what's happening here is that investors can project a lot onto this. They can project a lot of positivity and constructive outcomes for markets; and a lot of negativity and negative outcomes for markets.

So, for example, if you are really focused on the deficit impact of cutting taxes and whether or not there's enough spending cuts to offset those tax extensions, then you could look at the array of possible outcomes here and expect a major deficit expansion. And that might make you less constructive on bonds because you would expect yields to go higher as there was greater supply of Treasuries needed to borrow that much to finance the tax cuts. Again, not necessarily fully offset by spending cuts.

So, you could look at this and say, well, this will ultimately be something where economic growth helps tax revenues. And you might be looking at the benefits for companies and the feed through to the equity markets and think really positively about it.

And we think the truth is probably somewhere in between. You’re not going to get policy that really justifies either your highest hopes or your greatest fears here.

Ariana Salvatore: So, it's really like a Rorschach test for investors. When we think about our base case, how do you think that's going to materialize? What on the policy front are we watching for?

Michael Zezas: Yeah, so we have to consider the starting point here, which is Congress is trying to address a series of tax cuts that are set to expire at the end of the year. And if they extend all of those tax cuts, then on a year-over-year basis, you didn't really change any policy. So that just on its own might not mean a meaningful deficit increase.

Now, if Congress is able to extend greater tax cuts on top of that; but it's going to offset those greater tax cuts with spending cuts in revenue raises elsewhere, then again you might end up with a net effect close to zero on a deficit basis.

And the way our economists look at this mix is that you might end up with an effect from a stimulus perspective on the economy that's something close to neutral as well. So, there's a lot of policy changes happening beneath the surface. But in the aggregate, it might not mean a heck of a lot for the economic outlook for next year.

Now, that doesn't mean that there would be zero deficit increase in the aggregate next year because this is just one policy that is part of a larger set of government policies that make up the total spending posture of the government. There's already something in the range of $200-250 billion of deficit increase that was already going to happen next year. Because of weaker revenue growth on slower economic growth this year, and some spending that would automatically have happened because of inflation cost adjustments and higher interest on the debt. So, long story short, the policy that's happening right now that we think is going to be the endpoint for congressional deliberations isn't something our economists see as meaningfully uplifting growth for next year, and it probably increases the deficit – at least somewhat next year.

Now we're thinking very short term here about what happens in 2026. But I think investors need to think around that timeline because if you're thinking about what this means for getting deficits smaller, multiple years ahead, or creating the type of tax environment that might induce greater corporate investment and greater economic growth years ahead – all those things are possible. But they're very hypothetical and they're subject to policy changes that could happen after the next Congress comes in or the next president comes in.

So, Ariana, that's the overall look at our base case. But I think it's important to understand here that there are multiple different paths this legislation could follow. Can you explain what are some of the sticking points? And, depending on how they're resolved, how that might change the trajectory of what's ultimately passed here?

Ariana Salvatore: There are a number of disagreements that need to be resolved. In particular, one of the biggest that we're focused on is on the SALT cap; so that's the cap on State And Local Tax deductions that individuals can take. That raised about a trillion dollars of revenue in the first iteration of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act in 2017.

Republicans generally are okay with making a modification to that cap, maybe taking it a bit higher, or imposing some income thresholds. But the SALT caucus, this small group of Republicans in Congress, they're pushing for a full repeal or something bigger than just a small dollar amount increase.

There's also a group of moderate Republicans pushing against any sort of spending cuts to programs like Medicaid and SNAP; that's the food stamps program. And then there's another cohort of House Republicans that are seeking to preserve the Inflation Reduction Act. Ultimately, these are all going to be continuous tension points. They're going to have to settle on some pay fors, some savings, and we think where that lands is effectively at a $90 billion or so deficit increase from just the tax policy changes next year.

Now with tariff revenue excluded, that's probably closer to [$]130 billion. But Mike, to your point, there are these scheduled increases in outlays that also are going to have to be considered for next year's deficit. So, you're looking at an overall increase of about $310 billion.

Michael Zezas: Yeah, I think that's right and the different ways those different dynamics could play out, I think puts us in a range of a $200 billion expansion maybe on the low end, and a $400 billion expansion on the high end. And these are meaningful numbers. But I think important context for investors is that these numbers might seem a lot smaller than some of what's been reported in the press, and that's because the press reports on the congressional budget office scoring, and these are typically 10-year numbers.

So, you would multiply that one-year number by 10 at least conceptually. And these are numbers relative to a reality in which the tax cuts were allowed to expire. So, it's basically counting up revenue that is being missed by not allowing the tax cuts to expire. So, the context matters a lot here. And so we have been encouraging investors to really kind of look through the headlines, really kind of break down the context and really kind of focus on the short term impacts because those are the most reliable impacts and the ones to really anchor to; because policy uncertainty beyond a year is substantially higher than even the very high policy uncertainty we're experiencing right now.

So, sticking with the theme of uncertainty, let's talk timing here. Like we came into the year thinking this tax bill would be resolved late in the year. Is that still the case or are you thinking it might be a bit sooner?

Ariana Salvatore: I think that timing still holds up. Right now, the reconciliation bill is supposed to address the expiring debt ceiling. So, the real deadline for getting the bill done is the X date or the date by which the extraordinary measures are projected to be exhausted. That's the date that we would potentially hit an actual default.

Of course, that date is somewhat of a moving target. It's highly dependent on tax receipts from Treasury. But our estimate is that it's somewhere around August or September. In the meantime, there's a number of key catalysts that we're watching; namely, I would say, other projections of the X date coming from Treasury, as well as some of these markups when we start to get more bill text and hear about how some of the disputes are being resolved.

As I mentioned, we had text earlier this week, but there's still no quote fix for the SALT cap, and the house is still tentatively pushing for its Memorial Day deadline. That's just six legislative days away.

Michael Zezas: Got it. So, I think then that means that we're starting to learn a lot more about how this bill comes together. We will be learning even a lot more over the next few months and while we set out our expectations that you're going to have some fiscal policy expansion. But largely a broadly unchanged posture for U.S. fiscal policy. We're going to have to keep checking those regularly as we get new bits of information coming out of Congress on probably a daily basis at this point.

Ariana Salvatore: That's right.

Michael Zezas: Great. Well, Ariana, thanks for taking the time to talk.

Ariana Salvatore: Great speaking with you, Michael.

Michael Zezas: Thank you for your time. If you find Thoughts on the Market and the topics we cover of interest, leave us a review wherever you listen. And if you like what you hear, tell a friend or colleague about us today.