Former General Electric CEO Jack Welch has applauded Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump’s economic plan.
“I thought his comments were first-rate,” said Welch during an appearance on Fox Business Network. “I love his tax plan, I love capping the deductions on the wealthy and I think it’s very important that we have a growth-oriented policy and I love the policy that Trump outlined,” said Welch, who backed Texas Senator Ted Cruz’s White House bid.
“I have watched for eight years the squeezing down of this economy. The choking off with climate change being the number one priority—it’s not the number one priority. Terrorism is far ahead of climate change right now. We’ve got to get a country that’s growing and where everybody has opportunity,” he said.
Welch also described Trump as “presidential and substantive.”
Trump's proposal, which he detailed in a speech in New York, would reduce the top individual rate to 33 percent from the current 39.6 percent, Reuters reported. It would raise the standard deduction and cap itemized deductions, which he said would reduce tax loopholes. Trump said his plan would not add to the federal deficit.
Trump said the $4.4 trillion tax cut would actually cost less, about $2.6 trillion, under a mechanism known as dynamic scoring, which assumes that tax cuts will lead to faster growth, which in turn would allow at least some of the tax breaks to pay for themselves.
Trump also offered a "Penny Plan" for cutting federal spending. He said he would shrink government programs outside of defense by 1 percent each year. But entitlement programs such as Social Security and Medicare would be shielded from any cuts.
(Newsmax wire services and Bloomberg News contributed to this report).
© 2023 Newsmax Finance. All rights reserved.