That's an academic economist's phrase, but essentially, when you design tax policy, you try to both reduce inequality and minimize its impact on the incentive to work or invest. You can rarely do both, so you try to get the best ratio. In this case, the ratio between reducing inequality and the costs in terms of jobs and investment is extremely good. There's probably not much in the federal government's tool box that provides a better return on that.
On September 19th, 2024. See this statement in context.