Don't be surprised if a proposal billed as a middle-class tax cut emerges from the White House at some point next year. With the president's hope to make it an election issue — as recently described by his top economic policy advisor in an interview with CNBC — the idea is to lower taxes on America's middle earners in a package dubbed "Tax Cut 2.0." Yet one of the early ideas floated — reducing the 22% marginal rate to 15% — could miss the mark. "That actually wouldn't do much of anything to cut taxes for the middle class," said Daniel Bunn, director of global projects for the Tax Foundation, an independent tax policy research group.

President Donald Trump speaking in the East Room of the White House in Washington, DC. Michael Brochstein | Getty Images

"If cutting the rate doesn't really accrue to those folks, then maybe you look at broadening eligibility for refundable tax credits as a more direct route for a middle-class tax cut," Bunn said. The first round of tax cuts under the Trump administration — delivered via the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act — largely benefited the wealthy in its first full year of being in effect, critics say. On average, U.S. households paid about $1,300 less in individual income taxes in 2018 than they would have under the previous law, according to an estimate from the Tax Policy Center, which also does independent analyses of tax policy. About 65% paid less, 6% paid more and the remaining 29% paid about the same. However, broken down by income, the picture varies significantly: Households with less than about $25,000 got an average tax cut of about $40, compared with about $800 for those with income from about $48,000 to $86,000, and about $33,000 in tax savings for those with $733,000 or more in income (the top 1%).