WASHINGTON, Oct. 30 (Xinhua) -- Republicans in the U.S. House Committee on Ways and Means, the tax-writing committee of House of Representatives, are considering a gradual phase-in for the corporate tax cut, Bloomberg News reported on Monday.
Under the plan, the corporate tax rate may be reduced from its current 35 percent rate by three percentage points within a year starting in 2018, reaching 20 percent in 2022, the report said.
U.S. stocks fell to session lows on the news as the committee prepares to release the long-awaited text of the tax bill on Wednesday. The unified framework for tax reform that the Trump administration and congressional Republican leaders released last month had called for slashing corporate tax rates to 20 percent.
A gradual phase-in for the corporate tax cuts is part of Republicans' efforts to limit the tax bill's net revenue loss to 1.5 trillion U.S. dollars in a decade to satisfy the parameters of the budget resolution that the House and Senate have approved.
The budget resolution would also allow Republicans to pass their tax bill in the Senate without needing to secure any support from Democrats. Without that special procedure, it would become much more difficult for Republicans to get the tax bill through the upper chamber.
U.S. President Donald Trump and congressional Republican leaders have said recently that they hoped to pass the tax bill by the end of this year.
Tax reform is seen as the best hope for Trump and Republicans to score a major legislative victory before next year's congressional midterm elections, as they have failed to pass a bill to repeal and replace the controversial Obamacare earlier in the year.
