Perry outlines his plan in a WSJ op-ed. He's proposing an optional 20 percent flat tax. Kevin Drum imagines Perry's brainstorming session:
[Y]ou sort of have to admire Perry's gimmick of allowing everyone to choose between his plan and the existing income tax. You can almost imagine the conversation: one of his advisors points out that no matter how careful you are, someone will pay more under the new plan. Probably people with low incomes, and you just know the librul media will have a field day with that. "It's regressive! Rick Perry hates the poor!" It'll be a nightmare.
But Perry has a brainstorm! Give everyone a choice! This means that not one single person will pay more under his plan, because they can always choose the old system if they want. This means keeping all 60,000 pages (or whatever) of the old tax code, of course, so nothing really gets simplified.
Reihan calls the plan an "embarrassment." The spending side of his plan is equally gimmicky:
Rick Perry’s plan is to implement a ten percent reduction in spending, even though the share of elderly people in the population is rising, without so much as gesturing at which programs will be curtailed as a result.
Bartlett finds all the GOP talk of tax reform as really subservient to tax cuts. I note that Perry exempts the mortgage deduction, the charitable deduction, and state and local taxes deduction from abolition. Not exactly a profile in flat tax courage.
The Dish 