No Tax on Overtime Is a Potential Budget Proposal, but Has It Passed Congress?

Thus far, the Trump administration has prioritized executive action over legislative priorities, but even they know that a budget needs to pass through Congress in order to keep the federal government operational. At the very least, senators and congresspeople want to keep making their own salaries.

Following the news that House Republicans had passed a budget resolution, the first step toward passing a final budget, many want to know whether the Republicans have included several key proposals in that resolution, including no tax on tips or overtime. Here's what we know about the budget resolution.

The House passed a budget resolution, which is the first step toward passing a final budget, but not the final passage of a budget. All this means is that the House and Senate can now begin negotiations about what will be in the final bill, which reportedly includes $4.5 trillion in tax breaks and $2 trillion in budget cuts.

Every Democrat opposed the budget, and one Republican voted against it as well.

Although the budget resolution included some high-level numbers for tax and spending cuts, the final version of the budget has not passed, and there were no specific policy proposals in the resolution. As a result, we don't know whether proposals like no tax on overtime and no tax on tips will be in the final version of the budget. It remains a possibility, but that would likely just be one of many tax cuts in the new bill.

It seems distinctly possible that Trump's proposal to remove taxes on tips and overtime will be part of some version of the final budget bill. They were one of Trump's signature promises on the campaign trail, and are popular policies among the working-class voters that make up a portion of his base. What's unclear, though, is whether the long-term ramifications of these policies will ultimately benefit workers.

For now, though, the actual budget proposal is still taking shape, and while Trump will have a strong hand in negotiations over what is contained in the final version of the bill, this is the first time that Trump's administration will have to strongly consider input from the senators and members of Congress who will help the budget become law.

So it remains to be seen what exactly the final versions of these budgets will contain, and how much they will match the president's ideas for what a budget should look like.

Removing the tax on overtime might sound good, but it will be far from the only tax cut contained in this new bill.

Additionally, the cuts to federal spending could impact programs like Medicaid and SNAP benefits, as Republicans have suggested in the weeks leading up to this process. Those details, too, have yet to be finalized and will need to be negotiated through both houses of Congress.