(Forbes) - Amid the claims and counterclaims connected to the intended, as well as unintended, fallout from the Tax Cut and Jobs Act recently passed in Congress is this from Wine Institute (WI), concerning the Craft Beverage Modernization and Tax Reform Act that is part of the overall tax bill:

“Wine Institute applauds … Congressional action to enact the first reduction in wine excise taxes in over 80 years and only the second reduction in the nation’s history.”

In the last so-called tax reform legislation, in 1986, beverage alcohol hadn’t fared so well. That was the year of the Special Occupational Tax, a tax on top of excise taxes. The additional tax was levied just for the privilege of being in the beverage alcohol business; it was billed by the industry as a growth killer but lasted twenty-two years before its repeal in 2008.