Blog
In Drive to Cut Taxes, States Blow an Opportunity to Invest in Underfunded Services
July 7, 2021 • By Marco Guzman
Many states find themselves in a peculiar fiscal situation right now: federal pandemic relief money has been dispersed to states and revenue projections have exceeded expectations set during the pandemic. Meanwhile, more and more workers are returning to jobs as vaccines roll out and typical economic activity resumes. Some states, however, have decided to squander their unexpected fiscal strength on tax cuts.
President Joe Biden's American Families and Jobs plans intend to “build back better” and create a more inclusive economy. To fully live up to this ideal, the final plan must include undocumented people and their families.
Young workers are confronting a harsh economic reality filled with student loan debt and far too few good-paying jobs. The pandemic reinforced this group’s long history of not receiving proper benefits, such as health insurance, from their employers. They also are often overlooked when it comes to policies that promote economic wellbeing. The federal Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC), for example, is a glowing success story. It lifted 5.8 million people out of poverty in 2018, including 3 million children. But a key shortcoming of the federal EITC: working adults without children in the home receive little to no benefit.
Zoom Video Communications, the company providing a platform used by remote workers and school children across the country during the pandemic, saw its profits increase by more than 4,000 percent last year but paid no federal corporate income tax on those profits.
Targeted Relief and the American Rescue Plan in Five Charts
March 10, 2021 • By Stephanie Clegg
The American Rescue Plan Act is unique in that it employs the tax code to deliver relief to those struggling most. These five charts provide a glimpse of how the plan helps families across the income spectrum and also targets economic relief to low- and moderate-income families in the form of cash payments and expansions to the Child Tax Credit and Earned Income Tax Credit.
As the Senate takes up the COVID relief bill passed by the House last week, Senate Democrats have proposed to lower the income level at which the $1,400 cash payments would be phased out. New estimates from ITEP demonstrate that, for most people, the change would make no difference.
The federal minimum wage is almost comically low. At $7.25 an hour, it is 29 percent below its inflation-adjusted peak in the 1960s. Raising the minimum wage to $15 an hour would lift 900,000 Americans out of poverty. A solid 61 percent of voters support the idea. A majority of lawmakers in both the House and Senate support at least some version of a minimum wage hike. The popular $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan includes a measure that would raise the minimum wage over the next few years to $15. So, what is the problem? And why are lawmakers now…
An Unequal Recession Will Breed Unequal Recovery Without Bold Investments
February 26, 2021 • By Stephanie Clegg
Without bold investments now, experts predict a longer, more unequal recovery. President Biden's American Rescue Plan, the framework for legislation expected to pass this week in the House, would boost economic well-being for those whose livelihoods were most affected by the pandemic-induced economic crisis.
While the federal EITC provides a great deal of support for families with children, its impact is limited for those without children or who are not raising children in their homes. Childless workers under 25 and over 64 have for far too long received no benefit from the federal credit. And workers aged 25 to 64 have received very little value from the existing credit (the maximum credit is much smaller and the income limits more restrictive). The federal EITC’s meager benefits for just some childless adults lead to an inequitable outcome: the federal income tax system—which is ostensibly based…
CARES Act Helps Create $4.6 Billion Tax Cut for Health Care Companies Paying Opioid Settlements
February 12, 2021 • By Matthew Gardner
Talk about a one-two punch. A new report from the Washington Post reveals that the U.S. public is set to pay for the opioid crisis again. Already, communities across the country have paid a heavy price via the devastating public health toll. Now, it appears taxpayers will be on the hook for billions in corporate tax breaks as four pharmaceutical companies exploit a loophole in the Trump-GOP tax law and a CARES Act tax provision meant for companies facing pandemic-related profit losses.
Details of House Democrats’ Cash Payments and Tax Credit Expansions
February 9, 2021 • By Steve Wamhoff
The House Ways and Means Committee published its proposal for the cash payments, tax provisions and other changes that would make up part of the $1.9 trillion COVID relief legislation that President Joe Biden called for a few weeks ago.
States Are Finally Going Bold with Progressive Tax Efforts
February 4, 2021 • By Dylan Grundman O'Neill
Advocates, lawmakers, study commissions, and even governors in some states are proposing bold tax policy reforms that look beyond pandemic-induced budget shortfalls and the “K-shaped recovery” to address underlying inequities and underfunding that gave rise to them. These efforts include proposals to: end or reverse regressive tax policies like the preferential treatment of income derived from wealth over income earned through work; restore or strengthen estate and inheritance taxes to slow the concentration of wealth in ever-fewer hands; raise revenue and slow inequality with progressive income taxes; and many other ideas to right upside-down tax codes while raising the revenue…
The public and the Biden administration say corporations should contribute to the public infrastructure that lets them earn so much. We agree. It’s the least we can ask, in a pandemic and at all other times too.
Amazon Has Record-Breaking Profits in 2020, Avoids $2.3 Billion in Federal Income Taxes
February 3, 2021 • By Matthew Gardner
Amazon’s winning streak in its battle against the U.S. tax system remains intact. This week the retail giant announced record-breaking sales and income for 2020, and an effective federal income tax rate of just 9.4 percent, less than half the statutory corporate tax of 21 percent. If Amazon had paid 21 percent of its profits in federal income tax, that would have come to $4.1 billion. The company’s reported current tax of $1.8 billion was less than half that, meaning last year Amazon avoided $2.3 billion in taxes.
President Biden’s Child Tax Credit Proposal Could Right a Historical Wrong
February 2, 2021 • By .ITEP Staff, Jenice Robinson, Meg Wiehe
Many 1990s policies were grounded in harmful, erroneous ideas such as financial struggles are due to personal shortcomings and less government is better. Lawmakers didn’t apply these ideas consistently, however. For example, there was no drive to reduce corporate welfare even as policymakers slashed the safety net and disinvested in lower-income communities. So, it’s not surprising that a bipartisan group of lawmakers concluded during that era that the CTC was an appropriate vehicle to give higher-income households a tax break while leaving out poor children.
Pandemic Profits: Netflix Made Record Profits in 2020, Paid a Tax Rate of Less than 1 Percent
February 1, 2021 • By Matthew Gardner
Netflix’s “current” federal income tax for 2020 was $24 million, which equals just 0.9 percent of the company’s pretax income for the year. This is another way of saying Netflix paid an effective federal income tax rate of just 0.9 percent in 2020. If the company paid the statutory rate, its tax bill would be $572 million.
Happy Double Take: A President Who Takes Economic Challenges Seriously
January 15, 2021 • By Amy Hanauer
After a solid year of federal policy doing too little to combat staggering job loss, spiking poverty, a raging pandemic and nearly 400,000 COVID deaths, we are ready for a leader who wants to hunker down and get to work on behalf of the people. So we did a happy double take when President-elect Joe Biden outlined his economic plan last night.
New Leadership Should Seize Tax Justice Mandate; Cash Payments Offer On-ramp
January 8, 2021 • By Amy Hanauer
With the victory of Senators-elect Raphael Warnock and Jon Ossoff in Georgia, Democrats now control all three branches of government. New leaders should seize this moment to create a tax code that does much more to reduce inequality and to resource long-overdue investments in climate, health, education and other essentials. Most immediately, the historic election shifts power, making it easier to deliver on the promise to increase the recently enacted $600 cash payments to $2,000 per person.
How the Proposed $2,000 Cash Payments Compare to the $600 Already Provided by Congress
January 6, 2021 • By Steve Wamhoff
On Dec. 28, the House of Representatives passed the Caring for Americans with Supplemental Help (CASH) Act of 2020, which would increase the cash payment recently provided by Congress from $600 per person to $2,000 per person, among other changes. New estimates from ITEP compare the impacts of $2,000 payments to $600 payments.
National and State-by-State Estimates of New $600 Cash Payments
December 21, 2020 • By Steve Wamhoff
The House and Senate are about to pass the first COVID-19 relief legislation since the CARES Act was enacted in March. The new relief package includes, among other provisions, cash payments of $600 per person, which is half as large as the payments provided under the CARES Act, but also extends payments to spouses and children of certain undocumented immigrants who were left out of the previous payments.
A Second Round of Direct Cash Payments Could Provide an Average $1,550 to the Poorest Families
December 8, 2020 • By Jenice Robinson
It will not magically become easier for families to put food on the table or make their next rent payment. Policymakers must act. People are struggling because they are either out of work, involuntarily working part-time, trying to financially catch up after being out of work for a spell, or squeaking by because we live in a wealthy democracy that fails to guarantee basics such as access to affordable housing, health care, food, and jobs that pay living wages.
McConnell Balked at More Stimulus Aid to States, Betting Red States Wouldn’t Need It. Now?
December 4, 2020 • By Meg Wiehe
It is December 2020. Sen. McConnell has denied states—and their residents—relief for months. Congress must act now. Even if it does, it is unlikely to provide the robust aid needed to keep communities afloat and positioned for healthy recovery. Lawmakers across the country should be prepared to return to state capitals and city halls in the new year with plans to raise revenue not just to weather this crisis, but also to invest in long-term recovery.
These EITC Reforms Would Help Struggling Families Now and Address Systemic Challenges
December 4, 2020 • By Aidan Davis
The tepid economic recovery is leaving millions behind. The nation still has nearly 10 million jobs less than it did in February, according to the latest jobs report. The number of people living in or near poverty is rising. Twelve million workers are about to lose their unemployment insurance, roughly four in 10 people report experiencing food insecurity for the first time, and conditions are likely to deteriorate further in the weeks ahead as we brace for another deadly surge in COVID cases and new or tightened restrictions on business and personal activity.
COVID-19 Containment Is Key to Recovery—So Is Another Round of Stimulus
December 3, 2020 • By Aidan Davis
You can learn a lot about our leaders from how they act during times of crisis. This December, we are in our 10th month of the pandemic in the United States. With COVID cases climbing, deaths exceeding 270,000 and hospitalizations surpassing 100,000 for the first time, some states have halted reopening plans and imposed new restrictions. Containment of the virus is key to sustained economic recovery. As is another round of federal stimulus.
Better tax policies will help communities emerge from the current staggering fiscal crisis with tax structures that reduce inequality at a time when rich people are thriving and public services are under siege. Preserving public spending will boost the economy and improve lives–and cutting these essentials will not only hurt people but also deepen the downturn, a lesson we learned in the Great Recession’s slow recovery. Other states should take note.
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