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Massachusetts Voters Score Win for Tax Fairness with ‘Fair Share Amendment’
November 9, 2022 • By Marco Guzman
In a significant victory for tax fairness, Massachusetts voters approved Question 1—commonly known as the Fair Share Amendment—Tuesday night with 52 percent of the vote. The new constitutional amendment creates a 4 percent surcharge on income over $1 million, and the revenue will specifically fund education and transportation projects in the Bay State.
Key Republicans Say Negligible Decline in Economic Growth Outweighs Enormous Drop in Child Poverty
November 3, 2022 • By Joe Hughes
The expanded Child Tax Credit reduced child poverty dramatically and immediately. There is no debate or murkiness on this. Some lawmakers have decided that cutting child poverty in half is not worth the cost if it means an ambiguous and negligible decline in GDP growth. This view is not just cruel, it is bad economics.
Next Tuesday, voters will head to the polls to not only elect local and national leaders, but also let their voices be heard on a range of tax policy issues that could improve or worsen their state tax codes...
Tax Foundation’s ‘State Business Tax Climate Index’ Bears Little Connection to Business Reality
October 31, 2022 • By Carl Davis, Matthew Gardner
The big problem with the Index is that it peddles a solution that not only falls short of the goal of generating business investment, but one that actively harms state lawmakers’ ability to provide the kinds of public goods – like good schools and modern, efficient transportation networks – that businesses need and want.
Measures on the November Ballot Could Improve or Worsen State Tax Codes
October 26, 2022 • By Jon Whiten
In a couple of weeks, voters in a handful of states will weigh in on several tax-related ballot measures that could make state tax codes more equitable and raise money for public services, or take states in the opposite direction, making tax systems less fair and draining state coffers of dollars needed to maintain critical […]
Although the weather is beginning to cool down in parts of the country, the same cannot be said for many state economies, which are still running hot. That, however, doesn’t mean that the good times are guaranteed to last...
Congress Should Not Leave Children Out of Possible Year-End Tax Deal
October 3, 2022 • By Steve Wamhoff
If lawmakers believe it’s worthwhile to extend corporate tax breaks, then it would be entirely unreasonable for them to not conclude the same about tax provisions that help low-income children.
Do you remember/the big tax news innn September? Well, if not, we at ITEP got you covered...
Census Data Shows Need to Make 2021 Child Tax Credit Expansion Permanent
September 14, 2022 • By Joe Hughes
The Child Tax Credit expansion led to a 46 percent decline in childhood poverty. That it could be accomplished during the largest economic disruption in most of our lifetimes underscores a basic fact: thoughtful, decisive government action to combat poverty works.
Billionaires Should Pay Taxes on Their Income Every Year Like the Rest of Us
September 13, 2022 • By Steve Wamhoff
The Inflation Reduction Act signed by President Biden last month will crack down on corporate tax dodgers and strengthen enforcement of tax laws already on the books, raising hundreds of billions of dollars to be spent on climate, health and other priorities. But these reforms will not directly raise taxes on even the wealthiest individuals. […]
State Rundown 9/7: Labor Day Week Provides Sobering Reminder of Steps Forward, Back
September 7, 2022 • By ITEP Staff
Though Labor Day has passed, advocates on the ground in states across the country are continuing to uphold the spirit of the labor movement...
Romney Child Tax Credit Plan Would Leave Millions of Children Worse Off and Raise Taxes for the Average Black Family
September 7, 2022 • By Steve Wamhoff
Sen. Romney’s plan would expand the Child Tax Credit and offset the costs by scaling back other tax benefits. All told, it would raise taxes on a fourth of all kids in the U.S. This includes about a fourth of the children among the poorest fifth of U.S. families.
Four Tax Policy Wins in the Inflation Reduction Act and Four More That Can Build on This Progress
August 22, 2022 • By Joe Hughes, Jon Whiten
With four major tax policy provisions, the IRA takes a huge step toward a fairer tax code and a more equitable economy. But as always, there are more steps lawmakers should take to build on this progress.
Putting Cleveland and the Nation on a Path Toward Tax and Climate Justice
August 22, 2022 • By Amy Hanauer
Editor’s note: This originally ran as an opinion piece in the Cleveland Plain Dealer. When I left Cleveland to work on federal tax policy after 20 years running Policy Matters Ohio, I knew Ohio would stay in my heart and fuel my work. Accustomed to an America that often ignores our toughest problems, I understood […]
Editor’s note: This originally ran as an opinion piece in The Hill. Though the Inflation Reduction Act is enormously popular, some politicians and pundits are trying to generate hysteria about one feature: Funding for the IRS. All the false claims are distracting us from two important things: how necessary the funding increase is to reverse […]
Everyone loves a deal, so it’s no surprise why the appeal of the state sales tax holiday continues to persist. This year, 20 states will forgo more than $1 billion in combined revenue to enact a variety of sales tax holidays that—like most things that are too good to be true—will do little to provide meaningful benefits and instead undermine funding for public services.
Lawmakers Must Choose Between Funding the IRS or Protecting Wealthy Tax Cheaters
August 12, 2022 • By Steve Wamhoff
Grasping for some way to criticize the popular Inflation Reduction Act as it approaches final passage, Congressional Republicans have decided to attack its provisions that will reverse a decade of budget cuts to the IRS and instruct the agency to crack down on tax evasion by big corporations and individuals making more than $400,000. Of […]
State Rundown 8/10: States Still Talking Taxes as IRA Dominates Headlines
August 10, 2022 • By ITEP Staff
While federal tax policy has dominated the headlines with the Senate’s recent approval of the Inflation Reduction Act, lawmakers in statehouses across the country...
What Tax Provisions are in the Senate-Passed Inflation Reduction Act?
August 9, 2022 • By Steve Wamhoff
The Inflation Reduction Act approved by the Senate on Aug. 7 would raise more than $700 billion in new revenue over a decade by closing corporate tax loopholes, empowering the IRS to enforce the tax laws on the books, taxing stock buybacks, and extending a limitation on deductions for business losses. The IRA – if […]
They Might Really Do It: The Senate Is About to Reform Our Tax Code
August 5, 2022 • By Steve Wamhoff
For now, the Senate is poised to reverse cuts to the IRS enforcement against wealthy tax evaders for the first time in a decade, crack down on tax-dodging by huge corporations for the first time since 1986, and finally address the method increasingly used by corporations to transfer income to shareholders to avoid federal taxes. The multi-decade winning streak of corporate lobbyists and special interests who have practically written many of our tax laws in recent years is about to come to an end.
Corporations are Shifting Profits to Wealthy Investors Tax-Free—Stock Buyback Tax Would Change That
August 5, 2022 • By Joe Hughes
Senate Democrats have announced an agreement on the Inflation Reduction Act that, among other changes to a previous version of the bill, would apply a 1 percent tax on corporations repurchasing their own stock. This proposal was included in the House-passed Build Back Better Act last year and was estimated at that time to raise $124 billion over 10 years. This measure would ensure that income transferred from corporations to wealthy shareholders does not continue to escape taxation.
Corporate Minimum Tax Examples: Apple Would Likely Pay More, 3M Would Not
August 5, 2022 • By Matthew Gardner
Apple, one of the largest corporations in the United States despite manufacturing most of its physical products offshore, would likely pay the corporate minimum tax that is included in the Inflation Reduction Act that the Senate is debating this week. 3M, a manufacturer that has about 40 percent of its workforce in the United States, likely would not pay the corporate minimum tax if current trends in the company’s profits and taxes continue, because it is already paying above 15 percent of its profits in taxes.
Opponents of Inflation Reduction Act Call for Continued Tax Avoidance by Large Manufacturers
August 2, 2022 • By Steve Wamhoff
The biggest revenue-raising provision in the Inflation Reduction Act, the 15 percent minimum tax for corporations that have more than a billion dollars in profits, is under attack from members of Congress who argue that manufacturing companies should not be required to pay any minimum amount of tax. Sen. Mike Crapo, the top Republican on […]
Top Republican Tax-Writer Falsely Claims that Minimum Tax for Huge Corporations Is a Tax Hike on Middle-Class
August 2, 2022 • By Steve Wamhoff
Opponents of requiring corporations to pay even a minimum amount of taxes hold an unpopular position. But Sen. Mike Crapo, the top Republican on the Senate Finance Committee and a leader of that opposition, is using a one-sided and incomplete analysis to claim that the corporate minimum tax would raise taxes on low- and middle-income people.
State Rundown 7/27: It’s (Sales Tax) Holiday Season, But Who’s Really Celebrating?
July 27, 2022 • By ITEP Staff
It’s the holiday season – well, the sales tax holiday season, that is. But after taking a closer look, you may notice that there is little to celebrate...
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