It’s hard to go a week without seeing a politician or a news article hype up a state as the place that everyone is moving to – or should move to – because of low taxes. However, there’s a big problem with these proclamations: they aren’t true.
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blog February 20, 2024 The ‘Low-Tax’ Lie: States Hyped for Low Taxes Usually Only Low-Tax for the Rich
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ITEP Work in Action February 14, 2024 Better Wyoming: Somehow, Some Way, Wyoming Property Tax Relief is Coming
Buying a home is a goal for most hard-working Wyoming families, and achieving it is a cause to celebrate. But many homeowners in recent years have opened their annual property tax bills and been jolted by huge increases. In fact, residential property tax bills in Wyoming have gone up by an average of more than 80 percent over the past six years.
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media mention February 14, 2024 LA Times: Taxpayer ‘Protection’ or Taxpayer ‘Deception’? A New Ballot Measure Aims to Destroy State and Local Budgets
It’s indisputable that the decline of state fiscal management in California began with the passage of Proposition 13 in 1978. The tax-cutting initiative upended the tax structure that provided most of the revenues needed by localities and school districts, undermining the locals’ control of their own spending.
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ITEP Work in Action February 12, 2024 Common Good Iowa: Both Governor’s, Senate Plans Worsen Tax Inequalities
Iowans have traditionally valued expanding opportunity, caring for neighbors and a strong sense of fair play. Tax-cut proposals at the Iowa Statehouse from Governor Kim Reynolds and legislative leaders turn these Iowa values upside down. They would drastically restrict revenue needed to fund critical services such as education, health care, public safety and environmental quality. The Senate bill, SSB 3141, would set out to fully eliminate the income tax, which until recently has funded roughly half of the state budget. By targeting benefits to the wealthiest Iowans, the plans would throw an already inequitable tax system further out of balance.
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ITEP Work in Action February 12, 2024 Oklahoma Policy Institute: Economic Projections for Asylum Seekers and New Immigrants in Oklahoma
Immigration is hardly a new social trend in the state of Oklahoma. Of the four million people living in the state, 243,000 are immigrants, or six percent of the total population, according to the 2022 American Community Survey.
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media mention February 12, 2024 Stateline: If You Can Buy a ‘Mansion,’ You Can Pay a Tax for Affordable Housing, These States Say
To create a long-term revenue stream, Berg has proposed raising taxes on the most expensive real estate transactions, an increasing nationwide trend sometimes dubbed a “mansion tax.” Her legislation would increase the state’s tax on property sales above $3 million while decreasing the tax rate for less expensive sales. The change is estimated to create an additional $300 million in revenue each biennium, said Berg, chair of the House Finance Committee.
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media mention February 12, 2024 Center for Public Integrity: More Tax Cuts Put States’ Revenue At Risk
At least a dozen proposals for income tax cuts that would primarily benefit wealthy residents and big companies are already on the table for state legislatures to consider in 2024 — and… -
media mention February 12, 2024 Semafor: Immigration ‘Will Boost US Economy by $7 Trillion’ Over Next Decade
The ongoing surge of immigration to the United States will boost its economy by $7 trillion over the next decade by expanding the labor force and increasing consumer demand, a report from the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office found.
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ITEP Work in Action February 12, 2024 Audio: ITEP’s Miles Trinidad Talks About Oregon’s Upside-Down Tax Code
We’re talking taxes today on Policy for the People, specifically from the vantage point of the Oregonians with the fewest resources, those who are struggling the most to make ends meet. In our first segment, we hear about a brand new tax credit in Oregon designed to shore up the lowest-income families with young children in our state. Tyler Mac Innis of the Oregon Center for Public Policy explains who qualifies for the Oregon Kids’ Credit and why the creation of this new tax credit is a very good thing. But despite the positive development that the Oregon Kids’ Credit represents, Oregon’s tax system as a whole is one that continues to weigh more heavily on the lowest income families than anyone else. Miles Trinidad of the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy discusses the recently released report Who Pays? (https://itep.org/whopays-7th-edition/)
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ITEP Work in Action February 7, 2024 Center on Budget and Policy Priorities: High-Income People Who Received Large Net Tax Cuts in 2017 Law Don’t Need a New SALT Tax Cut
The House is poised to consider a new tax bill that would raise the cap on deductions for state and local taxes (SALT), giving another large tax cut to the same group of rich people who benefitted the most as a share of their incomes from the 2017 tax law. Over half of the benefits would go to those in the 95th to 99th percentiles for income — the biggest winners of the 2017 tax law — according to the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy (ITEP). This group doesn’t need another tax cut, and policymakers should reject the bill.
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ITEP Work in Action February 7, 2024 New Mexico Voices for Children: New Mexico has the Most-Improved Tax Fairness of Any State
New Mexico now has the ninth most progressive tax system in the nation as ranked by the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy’s recently updated Who Pays? report on tax incidence. That same report showed New Mexico as making the most progress toward tax fairness in the nation!
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ITEP Work in Action February 6, 2024 Center on Budget and Policy Priorities: Vermont Can Invest in Brighter Future With Targeted Income Tax Measure
According to estimates from the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy (ITEP), the proposal would fall almost exclusively on the state’s richest 1 percent of households, or those with average incomes of about $1.8 million a year.[2] The remainder of the state’s residents — who to be clear, already themselves contribute significant shares of revenue through existing taxes on income, sales, and property[3] — would see no change.
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media mention February 6, 2024 Yahoo Finance: Low-Earners in These 3 Low-Income Tax States Are Paying 5x More than the Rich in Taxes
The disparity between the rich and poor keeps growing with the disproportionate burden carried by low- and middle-income families. A recent report from the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy (ITEP), a nonprofit and nonpartisan organization dedicated to tax policy, sheds light on the regressive nature of state and local tax systems in the United States.
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ITEP Work in Action February 5, 2024 Video: ITEP’s Carl Davis Discusses ‘Who Pays?’ at Rhode Island Revenue Roundtable
ITEP researcher Carl Davis joins the Economic Progress Institute (EPI) for Rhode Island’s Revenue Roundtable.
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media mention February 5, 2024 MinnPost: Minnesota’s ‘Most Progressive’ Tax State Designation Explained
Minnesota is now the state with the nation’s most-progressive tax system in the U.S., as calculated by the left-leaning Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy. Its data-driven assessment looks at the share of state taxes that are borne by various income groups. Progressive is defined not in partisan terms but to describe tax systems that have higher income taxpayers devoting a larger percentage of their incomes to taxes than lower-income taxpayers.
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media mention January 31, 2024 The Hill: Tax Deal Likely Much More Expensive than Official Estimate, Experts Warn
“The $600B figure … is consistent with earlier estimates of the 10-year costs of these provisions if made permanent,” Joe Hughes, a policy analyst with Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy, told The Hill.
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ITEP Work in Action January 30, 2024 Rep. Rosa DeLauro: Fact Sheets on Tax Deal
“The tax deal fails on equity,” said Congresswoman DeLauro. “It delivers huge tax cuts for giant corporations while denying middle class families the economic security they had under the expanded, monthly Child Tax Credit. It also leaves the poorest families behind because of a policy choice. At a time when a majority of American voters believe tax on big corporations should be increased, there is no reason we should be providing corporations a tax cut while only giving families pennies.”
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media mention January 30, 2024 Audio: ITEP’s Carl Davis Discusses Idaho’s Regressive Tax System
Idaho has the 36th most regressive tax system in the nation, according to a new study by the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy.
The Who Pays report says that low- and middle-income families in Idaho pay more in taxes than the wealthy, and the institute also says that disparity has only gotten worse over the last five years.
May Roberts, Policy Analyst at the Idaho Center for Fiscal Policy, and Carl Davis, Research Director at the Institute of Taxation and Economic Policy, joined Idaho Matters to break down the study.
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ITEP Work in Action January 29, 2024 Policy Matters Ohio: New Data Show Just How Upside-Down Ohio’s Tax Code Is
In 2023, the lowest-paid Ohioans spent more than twice as much of their income on state and local taxes than the highest-paid, according to a new study by the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy (ITEP).
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ITEP Work in Action January 29, 2024 American Progress: DACA Recipients Bolster Social Security and Medicare
Eight years of survey data have shown that DACA recipients’ average reported hourly wages have increased by 137.2 percent, from $11.92 per hour in 2015 to $28.27 per hour in 2022. This not only benefits recipients and their families but also the entire country: According to the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy, thanks to DACA, recipients are able to contribute more in taxes as a result of increased employment rates, earnings, and tax compliance rates.
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ITEP Work in Action January 29, 2024 ITEP’s Carl Davis: Who Pays Vermont Taxes?
ITEP Research Director Carl Davis gave a presentation on Vermont’s tax system to that state’s Ways and Means Committee on January 25, 2024. Click here for the slide deck. -
media mention January 29, 2024 Video: ITEP’s Neva Butkus Discusses Wisconsin’s Tax Code on ABC News
“What this really comes down to is fairness,” Neva Butkus, a state policy analyst for the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy said.
She contributed to “Who Pays?,” the seventh edition of a periodic analysis offered by ITEP of tax policies in all 50 states.
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media mention January 29, 2024 AP News: Kansas Governor Vetoes Tax Cuts She Says Would Favor ‘Super Wealthy’
But the left-leaning Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy reported that even with the changes designed to benefit poorer taxpayers, 70% of the savings in raw dollars will go to the 20% of filers earning more than $143,000 a year.
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media mention January 29, 2024 Fatherly: What the New Child Tax Credit Would — and Wouldn’t — Do for Families
Various efforts have been made to revive the 2021 tax credit, which was wildly popular and is considered the “gold standard,” to CTC advocates, according to Joe Hughes, a Federal Policy Analyst at the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy, a non-profit, non-partisan tax policy organization. It’s also popular across party lines: A poll from Zero to Three and Morning Consult found that 85% of respondents want Congress to reinstate the 2021 CTC — 94% of Democrats and 77% of Republicans. But no effort in that direction has yet been successful.
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media mention January 29, 2024 CBS News: Vermont Wants to Fix Income Inequality by Raising Taxes on the Rich
Across the U.S., the rich generally pay a lower share of their income in taxes than low earners, according to the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy (ITEP). A recent analysis by the left-leaning think tank found that the average effective state and local tax rate paid by residents to their home state is 7.2% for the top 1% of earners; for the lowest-earning 20%, that rate tops 11%.