Over 20 business groups form coalition to oppose Biden's tax hike proposals

A woman wearing a mask is seen in a shopping mall in San Mateo, California, the United States, May 19, 2021.(Xinhua/Wu Xiaoling)

The coalition of 28 industry groups is organized to make the case that hiking taxes on individually and family owned businesses and corporations will hamper the U.S. economy in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, the Main Street Employers coalition said in a statement.

WASHINGTON, May 25 (Xinhua) -- More than two dozen groups representing U.S. businesses and employers have formed a coalition to oppose President Joe Biden's plan to raise taxes, arguing that such measures would hurt U.S. economic recovery.

The coalition of 28 industry groups is organized to make the case that hiking taxes on individually and family owned businesses and corporations will hamper the U.S. economy in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, the Main Street Employers coalition said in a statement.

The National Association of Wholesaler-Distributors, meanwhile, said on Twitter that the association is also joining forces with dozens of associations to oppose the tax hikes, forming the "America's Job Creators for a Strong Recovery."

"Main Street businesses took a big hit during the COVID crisis, and the latest Biden plan is a triple threat to individually- and family-owned businesses still struggling to recover," Chris Smith, executive director of the Main Street Employers coalition, said in an earlier statement.

"It would raise taxes on what they earn, raise taxes when they are sold, and raise taxes when they are passed from one generation to the next," Smith said, adding that the combined policies represent "one of the most anti-Main Street plans ever proposed."

Biden has unveiled two major spending plans with a multi-trillion-dollar price tag, and has called for tax hikes to offset the massive cost, urging corporate America and the wealthiest 1 percent of Americans to "pay their fair share."

Pedestrians walk by a restaurant in Washington D.C., the United States, May 5, 2021. (Photo by Ting Shen/Xinhua)

Calling the 2017 tax cut "a huge windfall" for corporate America and those at the very top, Biden said recently it had poured billions of dollars into the pockets of CEOs, widening the pay gap between CEOs and their workers.

"Wall Street didn't build this country. The middle class built this country," said the U.S. president, arguing that it's time to grow the economy from the bottom up and middle-out.

Biden said his tax policies, which include raising the corporate rate (from 21 percent to 28 percent), the top personal income tax rate (from 37 percent to 39.6 percent) and the capital gains rate (from 20 percent to 39.6 percent for households earning 1 million dollars or more), will help pay for what he proposed to spend in 15 years.

Republican lawmakers have lashed out at Biden's proposals, calling his multi-trillion-dollar spending plans "liberal daydream," and arguing that the tax hikes would lower wages, kill jobs and shrink the U.S. economy.

In a counterproposal to Senate Republicans last week, the White House lowered the overall price tag of Biden's 2.3-trillion-dollar infrastructure plan to 1.7 trillion U.S. dollars. Another spending proposal focusing on childcare and education would cost 1.8 trillion dollars.