Perry on Taxes: ‘I’d Go Back To More the 1986 Model,’ But Investors Paying Lower Rate Isn’t ‘Fair’

Republican presidential candidate and former Texas Governor Rick Perry stated, “I’d go back to more the 1986 model that Ronald Reagan had in place” on taxes and would tax hedge funds how they did in 1986, but that investors paying a lower rate “is not a fair system” on Thursday’s broadcast of “The Intelligence Report with Trish Regan”

Perry was asked [relevant remarks begin around 6:30] about taxing investments as income as relates to hedge funds. Perry answered, “Well, I think if — I think you have a fair tax process in this country, lower the corporate tax rate. I think just going after one set of people is a little bit — again, that’s just rhetoric. We need to have a simplistic tax –.”

Perry was then asked about people “making billions of dollars off of an investment, and instead of getting hit with normal income tax, and having to fork over, you know, 39% of it to the federal government, they basically have to pay roughly 20%.” He responded, “I obviously believe that that is a system — that is not a fair system. We need to have a fair tax system where people are taxed pretty much across the board.”

After Perry was asked if he would take investments as income, he said, “What I would do is I would have a rework of our tax system where that you have a system that simplifies the system, you spread it out, you lower the rates. I’d go back to more the 1986 model that Ronald Reagan had in place.”

Perry was again asked, “Would you allow those hedge fund guys, those billionaires, to be able to count their income, their investment as income?” He stated, “I would go back to the 1986 model is what I’m telling you. If they allowed that in 1986, then somehow or another our economy seemed to do pretty well under that system.”

Follow Ian Hanchett on Twitter @IanHanchett