WASHINGTON, Sept. 12 (Xinhua) -- U.S. President Donald Trump's goal of chopping the corporate tax from 35 percent to 15 percent could be unachievable, said U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin on Tuesday.
Addressing CNBC's Institutional Investor Delivering Alpha conference Tuesday morning, Mnuchin said tax reform is Trump's number one priority. Trump pushed the Congress on Aug. 30 to pass a comprehensive measure to overhaul the U.S. tax code.
"We're going to get this done by the end of the year," said Mnuchin.
He said the Trump administration will release a more detailed tax reform plan by the end of September.
Trump vowed to reduce the corporate tax to 15 percent to attract more companies to do business in the United States.
"I don't know if we'll be able to achieve that given the budget issues. But we're going to get this down to a very competitive level," Mnuchin said.
Economists have long called for a lower corporate tax in the United States, which is the highest among OECD countries. The major hurdle is how to fund the cut.
House Speaker Paul Ryan, who insisted on a revenue-neutral approach on tax reform, said last week that Trump's goal of lowering the corporate tax rate to 15 percent would be difficult to achieve.
"Our goal is to get in the mid-to-low 20s, and we think that that's an achievable goal," he said.
