CNBC All-America Economic Survey: The corporate tax split

Time now for the great corporate tax rate debate and where Americans stand on the issue of whether they should be higher, lower or stay the same. Steve Liesman joins us right now with some results from the CNBC All America survey. Steve, what did you find? Well, it is an issue Becky not talked much about yet. We’re about to talk about it, but it’s sure to be debated. And investors need to watch closely this battle over the corporate tax rate, in which the election is going to play a decisive role. President Biden, he wants to ratchet up the tax to 28% from 21%. That’s where it was before President Trump lowered it in 2017 to 21. The CNBC All America Economic Survey finding that 43% of the public want to keep it at 21 or even go lower. 45% want to restore it to 28% or even go higher. Paul is a margin ever 3.1%, so call this an absolute dead heat. A breakdown of the issue shows a little more intensity for the higher corporate tax deployed. You want to keep it at 21, but 24% want to go higher, including especially younger voters and the most liberal voters, of which of course there is some overlap there, just 14% wanted to go lower. That’s the left side of your screen there. The most conservative voters, they support cutting to 21, but there isn’t much popular support for it yet. There have been some articles suggesting that. Candidate Trump may want to cut below 21, but no public statement. We called the Trump campaign. They did not respond to our query for this story. The party breakdown, a mirror image everybody seen before, 78% of Democrats, they wanted a 28 or higher. 74% of Republicans want to keep it at 21 or go lower. What about the independence? They lead a bit towards the Democratic side, preferring the current tax rate or higher by a 45 to 36 margin. Now President Biden has proposed this 28% or increased 20% in his budget, but it’s not going anywhere in this Congress. How this settles that will be determined both by the presidential election, which party wins Congress in November, and Becky, perhaps a discussion about the deficit.