Trump promised tax refunds would jump '$1,000 or more'. The gains will go to wealthy Americans, experts say

[Igel]

4. The problem is that it depends who you are.

And it also depends on what would have happened if the tax cuts hadn't been extended.

My return went up a bit because I increased the money invested pre-tax for retirement up to about 1/3 of my take home pay. But had the tax cuts not passed, estimates are that I'd have been over $1000 less than last year--meaning, essentially, I'd owe about $500 before paying the person who did my taxes.

Because the question answered isn't the important question: "Did you return go up over last year?" Asking question is misdirection.

The question should be, "Did your return go up over what it would have been had the tax cuts expired yielded an effective tax increase?"

(The other thing to note that any tax cut will not help the bottom 40% or so of households because they effectively pay no Federal income tax--we can argue about FICA, Medicare, things like excise taxes or state taxes, but since the original debate is precisely over Federal income taxes let's not relocate the goal posts as necessary to make sure that the ball, once in flight, must score a goal and instead talk Federal income taxes. The only tax cut they could get would be to have refundable tax credits above and beyond any taxes owed.)