1,134 posts
Corporation for Enterprise Development (CFED): 2014 Assets & Opportunity Scorecard
• By ITEP Staff
In the wake of the recession, policymakers at all levels of government adopted policies aimed at hastening the recovery and increasing financial security and opportunity. Cities, counties and states created programs that connected the “unbanked” to the financial mainstream, raised the minimum wage and even encouraged poor children to save for college—significantly increasing the […]
Wisconsin Budget Project: Top 5% of Wisconsin Residents Get 18% of Tax Cuts Proposed by the Governor
• By ITEP Staff
The distribution of the tax cuts proposed by the Governor isn’t our chief concern about how he would use the projected state surplus. We’re primarily concerned that Governor Walker’s plan ignores holes in the current budget, and creates a deeper hole in the next one – boosting the structural deficit in 2013-15 to about $825 […]
Missouri Budget Project: Tax Proposals Before Senate Ways & Means Would Dramatically Reduce State Revenue, Disporportionately Benefit Wealthiest, But Not Create Jobs
• By ITEP Staff
The Missouri Senate Ways & Means Committee will hear three major tax bills this week. Though they differ in their components, each would drastically reduce state revenue, disproportionately benefit Missourians with the highest incomes, and fail to create jobs. MBP’s full analysis of the bills shows it would cost state services between $500 million and […]
Open Sky Policy Institute: Typical family pays less tax in Nebraska than in most similar states
• By ITEP Staff
Middle-income Nebraskans pay relatively low taxes compared to their counterparts in eight nearby states with similar economies and tax structures. A family earning the median family income in Nebraska ($63,442) would pay less in taxes than a similar family in all but two of these states – Colorado and Kansas. (Table 1) The other comparable […]
Michigan League for Public Policy: Tax Cuts Won’t Grow the Economy
• By ITEP Staff
Across-the-board income tax cuts will not boost Michigan’s economy but would contribute to rising income inequality, and further drain resources from public schools, community colleges, universities, health care and public safety—the very services that fuel economic growth. Despite claims that income tax cuts create economic growth, there is no evidence that they generate the […]
New Jersey Policy Perspective: $elling New Jersey $hort: Across-the-Board Income Tax Cut Would Harm the Garden State
• By ITEP Staff
An across-the-board state income tax cut would be detrimental to New Jersey’s future because it would do nothing to create jobs and grow the economy while disproportionately helping those who need it least and eroding public capacity to invest in the true building blocks of job growth and a strong economy. The state’s finances are […]
Wisconsin Budget Project: Governor Walker’s Tax Shift Plan Would Raise Taxes for Most
• By ITEP Staff
Governor Walker has said he is interested in eliminating the state’s income tax and raising the sales tax to make up for lost revenue, a move that would result in a tax increase for all but the wealthiest taxpayers. To replace the revenue lost by the income tax, the state sales tax rate would […]
Policy Matter Ohio: Homestead Exemption Still Out of Whack
• By ITEP Staff
The state budget approved in June limits eligibility for Ohio’s homestead exemption, but doesn’t do enough to focus the property-tax break on seniors who need it most. Read the Full Report
Hawai’i Appleseed Center: Creating a Fairer State Tax System and Economy for All Families
• By ITEP Staff
Our state’s lower-income families are faced with almost insurmountable structural challenges to escaping poverty. They face the highest cost of living and highest cost of shelter in the nation, with three-quarters of extremely low-income people spending over half of their income on shelter. At the same time, our wages are the lowest in the nation […]
New York State Tax Reform and Fairness Comission: Final Report
• By ITEP Staff
The New York State Tax Reform and Fairness Commission conducted a comprehensive and objective review of the State’s taxation policy, considering ways to eliminate tax loopholes, promote administrative efficiency and enhance tax collection and enforcement. Read the Full Report
Michigan League for Public Policy: The Path to Prosperity: Ten Steps Michigan Must Take to Strengthen Its Economy
• By ITEP Staff
Over the last decade, Michigan policymakers have addressed the state’s economic and fiscal problems largely through a combination of budget cuts, tax shifts and reliance on one-time revenues–under the mistaken assumption that the state could cut its way to prosperity, and create jobs and economic growth through reduced business taxes. In fact, the path to […]
Personal Income Tax Reform: Improving the Fairness of Taxes in the District of Columbia
• By Carl Davis
DC's tax system is markedly regressive. This is driven largely by the regressive impact of the city's sales, excise, and property taxes. The personal income tax is the only effective tool that DC has available for offsetting this regressivity. In the comments below I discuss four options for fine-tuning DC's income tax to lessen its impact on moderate- and middle-income taxpayers. I also describe four options for funding those tax cuts with policies that would…
Policy Matters Ohio: Another Ohio tax cut for the affluent?
• By ITEP Staff
Senate bill 210 would take the savings from Medicaid expansion and use it for an across-the-board income-tax cut that might buy a cup of coffee for low-income Ohioans but would give the average top earner enough for a trip to Paris. Read the Full Report
Arkansas Advocates for Children and Families: Arkansas tax system should do more for working families
• By ITEP Staff
According to a new report from Arkansas Advocates for Children and Families (AACF), tax changes passed during the 2013 session consisted largely of personal income tax cuts benefiting upper-income taxpayers and sales and use tax cuts targeted to specific industry groups. “A Better Foundation: Building a tax system that works for Arkansas families” makes the […]
Policy Matters Ohio: A Credit that Counts
• By ITEP Staff
More than 440,000 Ohioans will be eligible for the state’s new Earned Income Tax Credit, at an average of $74 per recipient. However, the Ohio EITC is one of the smallest among state credits and has three weaknesses that mean it does less to help working families and reduce poverty than it should. Read the […]
Open Sky Policy Institute: “Real Taxpayers of Nebraska” and cutting the top income tax rate
• By ITEP Staff
In this “Real Taxpayers” infographic, we examine what cutting Nebraska’s top personal income tax rate to 5.75% would mean for our tax payers. The cut would result in a $156 million revenue loss for the state, which is close to the amount of revenue the state would gain under the sales tax base expansion we […]
Paying for Education Finance Reform in Colorado
• By Carl Davis
As this report shows, this change would somewhat reduce the steep regressivity of Colorado's overall tax system. In other words, taxpayers across all income levels would pay a more equal share of their income if Amendment 66 is approved, in large part because most of the revenue raised by the amendment would come from the wealthiest 20 percent of Colorado residents.
Colorado Fiscal Institute: Amendment 66 will Improve Colorado’s Income Tax
• By ITEP Staff
Amendment 66 will restore Colorado’s ability to raise enough revenue to meet our schools’ growing needs and make the income tax more like those of our neighboring states, all without overburdening Coloradans. From the adoption of the income tax in 1937 through 1986, Colorado used a “tiered” income tax, where tax rates rose along with […]
Oregon Center for Public Policy: A Grandly Flawed Bargain
• By ITEP Staff
The revenue package that Governor Kitzhaber has presented to the Oregon legislature to consider in a special session starting September 30 suffers from three major flaws: revenue shrinks after the current budget period, it’s mainly a tax cut for some of Oregon’s wealthiest 1 percent, and it won’t create any jobs, despite what its proponents […]
Massachusetts Budget and Policy Center: After the Tech Tax Repeal- Remembering the Big Picture
• By ITEP Staff
The FY 2014 budget included new investments in our transportation system, in education, and in other areas. Part of the funding for these came from a “tech tax,” which is likely to be repealed without being replaced by an ongoing revenue source. This report explores some of the ways we might in the future fund […]
A Federal Gas Tax for the Future
• By Carl Davis
Gas tax revenues are on an unsustainable course. Over the last five years, Congress has transferred more than $53 billion from the general fund to the transportation fund in order to compensate for lagging gas tax revenues. By 2015, the transportation fund will be insolvent unless an additional $15 billion transfer is made. Larger transfers will be needed in subsequent years.
Center for American Progess: The Real Cost of Cuccinelli
• By ITEP Staff
Besides working on these major research projects, I developed CTJ/ITEP’s strong online media presence. One of the most important roles I play is as the primary web manager for both CTJ and ITEP. Similarly, over the past two years I successfully initiated and then maintained CTJ and ITEP’s social media presence. Center for American Progress […]
Open Sky Policy Institute: A golden opportunity for tax changes
• By ITEP Staff
After analyzing options for tax changes put forth by the Tax Modernization Committee, we believe some present a real opportunity to strengthen Nebraska and its economy. Ideas that the committee will discuss at upcoming public hearings that start Monday in Scottsbluff would bolster investments in education, health care and public safety as well as […]
Low Tax for Who?
• By Meg Wiehe
Annual state and local finance data from the Census Bureau are often used to rank states as "low" or "high" tax states based on taxes collected as a share of state personal income. But focusing on a state's overall tax revenues overlooks the fact that taxpayers experience tax systems very differently. In particular, the poorest 20 percent of taxpayers pay a greater share of their income in state and local taxes than any other income…
State Tax Codes As Poverty Fighting Tools
• By Meg Wiehe
New Census Bureau data released this month show that the share of Americans living in poverty remains high, despite other signs of economic recovery. The national 2012 poverty rate of 15 percent is essentially unchanged since 2010 , but still 2.5 percentage points higher than pre-recession levels. This means that in 2012, 46.5 million, or about 1 in 6 Americans, lived in poverty.1 The poverty rate in most states also held steady with five states…
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