Just Taxes Blog by ITEP

Category: State Policy


  • Amy Hanauer
    Amy Hanauer
    Executive Director
    March 5, 2025

    Trump’s Address to Congress Obscures His Actual Tax Agenda

    In last night’s address to Congress, President Trump spent more time insulting Americans, lying, and bragging than he did talking about taxes. But regardless of what President Trump and Elon Musk talk about most loudly and angrily, there is one clear policy that they and the corporations and billionaires that support them will try hardest […]
  • Neva Butkus
    Neva Butkus
    Senior Analyst
    February 26, 2025

    Mississippi Considers Deep Tax Cuts Amidst Budget and Economic Uncertainty

    At a time when states across the country are forecasting deficits or anticipating slowing revenue growth, Mississippi lawmakers are debating deeply regressive and expensive tax cuts that would overwhelmingly benefit their state’s richest residents.
  • Rita Jefferson
    Rita Jefferson
    Local Analyst
    February 26, 2025

    Learn from Prop 13 History to Avoid Repeating Past Mistakes

    Worries about housing costs and property tax bills are leading people to check the history books for solutions, but there’s a danger that they’ll repeat past mistakes. If anti-tax lawmakers carelessly weaken property taxes as they did in the 1970s, as they did with California’s Proposition 13, they will undercut public finances, making municipalities, school districts, and other special districts worse off.
  • Aidan Davis
    Aidan Davis
    State Policy Director
    February 20, 2025

    Wide-Ranging 2025 State Tax Debates Come into Focus

    In the face of immense uncertainty around looming federal tax and budget decisions, many of which could threaten state budgets, state lawmakers have an opportunity to show up for their constituents by raising and protecting the revenue needed to fund shared priorities. Lawmakers have a choice: advance tax policies that improve equity and help communities thrive, or push tax policies that disproportionately benefit the wealthy, drain funding for critical public services, and make it harder for most families to get ahead. 
  • Carl Davis
    Carl Davis
    Research Director
    February 11, 2025

    Turning IRS Agents to Deportation Will Reduce Public Revenues

    The Trump Administration’s plan to turn IRS agents into deportation agents will result in lower tax collections in addition to the harm done to the families and communities directly affected by deportations.
  • Brakeyshia Samms
    Brakeyshia Samms
    Senior Analyst
    February 3, 2025

    Policymakers Could Consider Using Tax and Transfer Policy to Reduce the Racial Retirement Wealth Gap

    As we show in our recent study, this is, in part, due to longstanding discrimination shaping racial differences in economic wellbeing in the U.S. Moreover, aspects of federal and state tax policies have helped create the vast racial retirement wealth gap in place today. For this reason, we evaluate how tax and transfer policy reforms could help shrink racial retirement wealth inequality. To inform lawmakers as they approach the 2025 debates, below we offer several guiding principles.
  • Miles Trinidad
    Miles Trinidad
    State Analyst
    January 30, 2025

    Maryland Gov. Wes Moore’s Tax Plan Boosts Revenue, Increases Fairness

    Maryland’s Gov. Wes Moore put forward a tax reform plan that would make the tax system fairer, simpler, and better able to meet the state’s needs. The proposed changes to the income tax ask more of those at the top and provide an average tax cut for those earning less.

  • January 30, 2025

    Maryland’s Tax Reform Likely Won’t Cause Millionaire Migration

    The moment Gov. Wes Moore announced his proposal to reform Maryland’s tax system, in part, by raising income tax rates on high-income households, opponents began predicting that wealthy people would respond by leaving. Experience from other states says that’s not the case. 
  • ITEP Staff
    January 15, 2025

    State Rundown 1/15: Tax Debates Heat Up Despite Winter Weather

    While frigid temperatures expected across a large swath of the country, major tax proposals are heating up in the states. Governors are giving their State of the State addresses and state lawmakers have begun to convene for 2025. New York Gov. Kathy Hochul announced plans to expand the state’s Child Tax Credit earlier this year and has since announced nearly $1 billion in income tax cuts. Maryland Gov. Wes Moore unveiled a new tax proposal aimed at helping close the state’s looming revenue shortfall. The plan would increase taxes on the wealthy and cut taxes for many low- and middle-income households. Meanwhile, lawmakers in Mississippi introduced misguided legislation that would phase out their personal income tax over time and reduce the state sales tax rate on groceries.  
  • Rita Jefferson
    Rita Jefferson
    Local Analyst
    January 14, 2025

    Policymakers Unwisely Propose Cutting Property Taxes in Favor of Sales Taxes

    Lawmakers across the country are taking aim at property taxes with a new strategy: raising sales taxes instead. Doing so would create a regressive tax shift that puts unfair burdens on renters and reduces the strength of local government revenues.
  • ITEP Staff
    January 9, 2025

    State Rundown 1/9: New Year, New Pushes for Tax Policy Changes

    It’s a new year, and state legislatures across the country are resolved to write new tax policy. Tax debates are heating up nearly everywhere in the early days of 2025, but states’ fiscal situations vary dramatically. New York is considering expanding the state’s Child Tax Credit following Gov. Hochul’s proposed expansion. On the other side […]
  • Marco Guzman
    Marco Guzman
    Senior Analyst
    January 6, 2025

    Undocumented Immigrants Pay More Than Their Fair Share of Taxes

    Undocumented immigrants help fund teacher salaries, road and bridge repairs and other local quality-of-life improvements. They also pay into vital programs that make up our social safety net (including Social Security, Medicare and unemployment insurance) even though they will likely never see any benefits from these programs — because, in most circumstances, they are legally prohibited from accessing them.
  • Alex Welch
    Alex Welch
    Assistant Communications Director
    December 17, 2024

    ITEP’s Top Charts of 2024

    As we close out 2024, we want to lift up the tax charts we published this year that received the most engagement from readers. Covering federal, state, and local tax work, here are our top charts of 2024. 

  • December 3, 2024

    State Rundown 12/3: Some States Cast Away Fiscal Responsibility as They Plan for 2025

    The 2025 legislative season will be here before we know it, and state lawmakers have begun unveiling their priorities and proposals. Unfortunately, despite stagnating revenue growth, many lawmakers continue to push for deep, regressive tax cuts - often before the full impact of previous tax cuts is felt.
  • Neva Butkus
    Neva Butkus
    Senior Analyst
    November 26, 2024

    Louisiana Lawmakers Pass Deeply Regressive Tax Plan

    Louisiana Gov. Jeff Landry called the legislature back to the capitol the day after the national election to take up his plan to overhaul the state’s tax system during a 20-day special session. Our analysis shows the tax overhaul would worsen the inequity already rampant in Louisiana’s tax system while potentially shortchanging essential services for families across the state.
  • Neva Butkus
    Neva Butkus
    Senior Analyst
    November 26, 2024

    Average Louisianans Will Pay for Gov. Landry’s Tax Break for the Rich

    Tax cuts for the wealthy and corporations will not make Louisiana more competitive. Rather, they will blow a hole in the state budget while asking low- and middle-income working families to make up the difference. Gov. Landry and the Louisiana legislature would make much better use of their time looking for ways to make Louisiana’s tax structure fairer and more capable of adequately funding important priorities.

  • November 20, 2024

    State Rundown 11/20: Some Budgets and Tax Proposals Fail to Defy Gravity, Fall Short

    This week, there are high-profile budget and tax debates at both the state and local levels. The Louisiana legislature continues to debate Gov. Jeff Landry’s deeply regressive tax package in a special session focused on replacing corporate and personal income tax revenue with additional sales taxes, but some efforts to find offsets for the cuts […]
  • Brakeyshia Samms
    Brakeyshia Samms
    Senior Analyst
    November 20, 2024

    State Tax Policy Should Adopt the Principles of ‘Black Women Best’

    Focusing policy analysis on Black women illustrates how Black women have long shouldered the shortcomings of the economy and clearly points to solutions that work for all. Black women are at their best when they are financially secure, healthy, and free – and our economy is at its best when all people can thrive and benefit.
  • Amy Hanauer
    Amy Hanauer
    Executive Director
    November 12, 2024

    Taxing Transportation Is One Great Way to Reduce Carbon Emissions

    Federal, state, and local tax codes are important but underused tools that can create a more climate-resilient, less carbon-emitting America. A modernized tax code would stop subsidizing emissions and instead encourage lower-carbon design. Because cars and trucks produce roughly one-fourth of US greenhouse gas emissions, transportation taxation is a great starting point.

  • November 7, 2024

    State Rundown 11/07: Election Week and New Special Sessions

    Tax policy results are mixed across the country as many voters weigh in on state and local ballot measures. For example, Washington state voted to maintain its new progressive tax on capital gains; Georgia voters capped growth in property tax assessments; Illinois voters approved a call for a millionaires’ tax; North Dakota voters rejected property […]

  • October 24, 2024

    State Rundown 10/24: Tricks, Treats, and Tax Policy

    Louisiana Gov. Jeff Landry is proposing a regressive tax reform package that would enact a flat personal and corporate income tax while expanding the state’s sales tax base and eliminating certain exemptions to make up for a portion of the lost revenue. West Virginia continues to chip away at its personal income tax, one of the state’s few progressive revenue options. And advocates in New York are rallying around a package of progressive tax legislation that would tax capital gains at higher rates, enact higher income tax brackets on multi-millionaires, and tax unrealized capital gains of billionaires.
  • Jon Whiten
    Jon Whiten
    Deputy Director
    October 17, 2024

    2024 State Tax Ballot Questions: Voters to Weigh in on Tax Changes Big and Small

    As we approach November’s election, voters in several states will be weighing in on tax policy changes. The outcomes will impact the equity of state and local tax systems and the adequacy of the revenue those systems are able to raise to fund public services.

  • October 10, 2024

    State Rundown 10/10: More Special Sessions, More Proposed Tax Cuts

    This week several states are getting an early start at writing new tax policy in special sessions. In West Virginia, the legislature has come to an agreement with Gov. Justice on an additional tax cut—on top of already-planned cuts. The 2 percent cut will cost the state $49 million a year and come from spending […]

  • September 18, 2024

    State Rundown 9/18: Special Tax Session Results? “Reply Hazy, Try Again”

    As the dust settles...

  • September 5, 2024

    State Rundown 9/5: Property Tax Policy Continues to Make Headlines

    Property tax bills are undeniably a concern for many low- and moderate-income households across the nation...

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