Cain’s Sales Tax Would Hurt Consumer Spending ’For Some Years’

Republican presidential candidate Herman Cain’s plan to create a national sales tax would hurt retailers, threaten economic growth and shift the tax burden onto the middle class and poor, tax experts and business groups said.

Cain’s so-called 9-9-9 plan, which would replace the current tax code with a system of three separate taxes of 9 percent each, has boosted his popularity among voters. The former chief executive officer of Godfather’s Pizza has surged in polls in recent weeks, and a Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll released this week put him in the lead.