Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy

ITEP's Research Priorities

Marketplace: Key Question on The GOP Tax Plan: What’s Your ZIP code?

November 3, 2017

ITEP Research Director Carl Davis talks to Marketplace about the state and local tax deduction. Read more or listen

Fortune: Did You Catch the Huge Loophole in the GOP Tax Plan? The Rich Sure Did.

November 3, 2017

Following in an excerpt from an op-ed by Alan Essig published in Fortune. In September, shortly after the GOP released the initial framework for its so-called middle-class tax plan, multiple independent analyses revealed that millionaires would reap the greatest benefit, both as a share of the entire tax cut and as a percentage of their […]

Mother Jones: Republicans Unveil Huge Corporate Tax Cuts Paid For by Deficit-Spending

November 3, 2017

Completely repealing the state and local deduction would lead to taxes going up for 1 in six Americans, according to the left-leaning Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy. In a high-tax state like Maryland, nearly 1 in 3 households would see their taxes increase. Read more

Las Vegas Review Journal: GOP Unveils Tax-Reform Bill That Faces Political Hurdles

November 3, 2017

Alan Essig, executive director of the left-leaning Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy, rejected GOP claims that the bill would help the middle class. “The starting point for tax reform has always been to drastically cut corporate taxes with the promise that benefits would trickle down to the working poor. … The core of this […]

Newsweek: Tax Reform Plan Is More Radical Than You Think

November 3, 2017

Critics note that there are plenty of other ways wealthier earners would do well. “Keeping the top tax rate at 39.6 percent for millionaires is a cosmetic change meant to make this tax plan more palatable. Unless tax writers take out other provisions that almost exclusively benefit the highest-income households, millionaires will still benefit most,” […]

Associated Press: Why Tax Plan Might Not Put US Firms’ Overseas Cash to Work

November 3, 2017

Apple has more than $230 billion overseas, Microsoft $124 billion, according to the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy. Returning those overseas profits to America, the Republicans say, would give the economy a healthy jolt as companies put their newly available cash to work. But critics note that a similar one-time “tax holiday” on overseas […]

Vox: 2 Winners and 3 Losers from the Republican Tax Bill

November 3, 2017

The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, pulling together assessments from the Congressional Budget Office, the Joint Committee on Taxation, the Tax Policy Center, the Treasury’s Office of Tax Analysis, and the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy, found that workers would only receive a quarter or less of the benefits from tax cuts — […]

Washington Post: Answers to Major Questions about the Republican Tax Plan

November 3, 2017

Boosting corporate income tax rates and squeezing loopholes would hurt other companies, such as capital intensive industries. Oil and gas companies, for example, take advantage of special depreciation rates, two of which are about a century old. International companies – such as pharmaceutical or technology firms – shelter income abroad to avoid taxes in the […]

Dallas Morning News: Was Exxon Mobil’s Tax Rate Last Year Really -5.1%?

November 3, 2017

So, who’s right? “They are both correct,” said Matt Gardner, senior fellow at the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy. “They’re just measuring different things.” Tax breaks, financial reporting rules and differing tax rates around the world make looking at these numbers a tricky business. In fact, both experts interviewed by The Dallas Morning News on […]

news release  

Bottom-Line Conclusion about GOP Tax Plan Is the Same After Reviewing More Details

November 2, 2017 • By Alan Essig

Bottom-Line Conclusion about GOP Tax Plan Is the Same After Reviewing More Details

Instead of engaging in thorough, public process that may have yielded real tax reform for middle-class families, lawmakers covertly put together a plan that reserves its biggest benefits for corporations and the wealthy while throwing in a few gimmicks for political cover.

news release  

Even if Top Marginal Tax Rate Remains 39.6%, GOP Tax Plan Will Still Largely Benefit the Wealthy

November 1, 2017 • By ITEP Staff

Even if Top Marginal Tax Rate Remains 39.6%, GOP Tax Plan Will Still Largely Benefit the Wealthy

Keeping the top tax rate at 39.6 percent for millionaires is a cosmetic change meant to make this tax plan more palatable. Unless tax writers take out other provisions that almost exclusively benefit the highest-income households, millionaires will still benefit most.

Between the Lines: Trickle Down Hoax Central to GOP Tax Reform Plan

November 1, 2017

Between The Lines’ Scott Harris spoke with Matthew Gardner, senior fellow with the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy, who assesses the winners and losers in the Republican tax reform plan, and the real world track record which proves that trickle-down economics is a lie. MATTHEW GARDNER: The plan we’re looking at right now, as […]

NPR’s On Point: Who Benefits from GOP Tax Plan

October 30, 2017

We go to the biggest legislative push yet by the president and Republican Congress:  to overhaul American taxes.  Details slated to be released this week, with a lightning-fast push through Congress as the GOP dream.  Who wins, who loses.  This hour, On Point:  We ask what to look for in the coming GOP tax plan. —Tom […]

Fortune: You’re Better off in a State with High Income Tax

October 27, 2017

Following is an excerpt written by Carl Davis, ITEP’s research director, and published in Fortune. Many lawmakers in Congress and in statehouses around the country peddle the same supply-side theory about income taxes: the lower the tax, the more the economy will grow. But new research from the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy reveals […]

MarketWatch: Trump-Ryan Tax Plan Will Encourage More Corporate Offshore Tax Avoidance

October 27, 2017

The figures are staggering. At least 366 of the Fortune 500 companies have established subsidiaries in tax-haven countries. The companies pay an average tax rate of 6.1% on their “foreign” earnings, evading a cumulative $750 billion in federal taxes, according to a study by the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy. Some of these foreign […]

The Week: The GOP’s Head Fake on Taxes

October 27, 2017

But this little adjustment would barely shift the overall effects of the tax plan at all. “Taxpayers with total income exceeding $1 million would receive an average tax cut of $138,000 in 2018” under the original GOP framework, the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy explained in an analysis. “If this modification is made to […]

Mother Jones: Republicans Fast Track Tax Cut for the Wealthy

October 27, 2017

Most of the Republican opposition came from the GOP’s plan to eliminate deductions for state and local taxes, with 11 Republicans from New York and New Jersey voting against the bill. Eliminating the deduction, which disproportionately affects well-off families in high-tax states, is the main reason why Trump’s plan would raise taxes on one in six Americans, […]

Fusion: Income Tax Is Great

October 27, 2017

A report from the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy examines the results of a natural experiment on taxation that has emerged within our country: The economic performance of the states that have no income tax versus the economic performance of the states that have the highest income taxes. So just how badly have these […]

The Street: Proposed Gas Tax Increase Could Harm Consumers

October 27, 2017

Since 2013, 26 states have raised their gas taxes with eight alone in 2017, according to a report conducted by the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy, a non-profit and non-partisan research organization in Washington. Read more

Washington Post: Happy Hour Roundup

October 27, 2017

The Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy releases a report showing that states with higher personal income taxes have higher economic growth, higher wage growth, and lower unemployment than states with lower taxes. Read more

NY Daily News: D.C.’s Budget Takes Dead Aim at NYC

October 27, 2017

The Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy finds that 84% of the tax cuts received by New York State residents would go to the richest 1% of households here — those with income of at least $872,000. The one-percenters would get an average tax break of nearly $104,000, or 314 times the $330 that a […]

City Pages: Emmer, Paulsen, and Lewis Decide the Deficit Isn’t So Important After All

October 27, 2017

The 1 percent gets served first, of course. The wealthiest Minnesotans will receive 62 percent of the state’s tax cuts next year for an average of $66,000, according to the nonpartisan Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy. Middle-class Minnesotans get 7 percent of cuts, or an average of $370. Unfortunately, this presents a new problem. […]

American Prospect: Republicans Want to Make Corporate Tax Avoidance Easier

October 26, 2017

According to a recent report by the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy and the U.S. PIRG Education Fund, 73 percent of Fortune 500 companies have subsidiaries in a low-tax country. All told, American corporations have steered more than $2.6 trillion in earnings into offshore tax havens. The specter of corporate profit-shifting has become more […]

Star-Ledger: You’re Now More at Risk of Losing Your Property Tax Break

October 26, 2017

The loss of the state and local tax deduction would mean higher taxes for 26.4 percent of New Jersey taxpayers, according to a study by the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy, a progressive research group in Washington. That was second to Maryland, at 30.5 percent, the group said. Read more

International Business Times: Do Lower Taxes Spur Economic Growth? What Happened In No-Tax States

October 26, 2017

Researchers at the non-partisan and non-profit Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy compared the nine states without personal income taxes, which include Florida, Texas and Washington, to the nine states with the highest top marginal tax rates over the last decade, which include California, New York and Oregon. They found the states with the highest […]