ITEP Work in Action
Advocates and policymakers at the state and federal levels rely on ITEP’s analytic capabilities to inform their debates on proposed tax policy changes. In any given year, ITEP fields requests for analyses of policies in 25 or more states. ITEP also works with national partners to provide analyses of federal tax policy proposals. This section highlights reports that use ITEP analyses to make a compelling case for progressive tax reforms.
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ITEP Work in Action June 17, 2020 New Jersey Policy Perspective: Unemployment Insurance Taxes Paid by Undocumented Workers Top $1 Billion
Over the past ten years, unemployment insurance taxes paid based on undocumented immigrants’ work in New Jersey added more than $1.36 billion to state and federal unemployment insurance trust funds,… -
ITEP Work in Action June 9, 2020 New Jersey Policy Perspective: Road to Recovery: Reforming New Jersey’s Income Tax Code
A sensible way to address revenue shortfalls and an unfair tax code is to raise income taxes on the state’s wealthiest households. By reforming New Jersey’s income tax, our recovery… -
media mention October 29, 2018 NJ Spotlight: GOP Leaders Call on NJ Democrats to Reconsider Middle-class Tax Cuts
The related tax-cut bills — and another that would shield most retirement-savings contributions from state income taxes — were introduced at the start of the year but have not been posted for votes by the Democratic leaders who control the Assembly’s agenda. Bucco suggested a report released earlier this month by the left-leaning Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy that found middle-income taxpayers in New Jersey pay a higher effective tax rate than any other group — including the top 1 percent of earners — as a reason to begin prioritizing adoption of the GOP bills.
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ITEP Work in Action October 22, 2018 NorthJersey.com: 2018 Elections: Candidates Taking Wait-and-See Approach to SALT Deductions
A study by the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy, a non-partisan think tank, found that a majority of New Jersey taxpayers in every income group will pay less taxes next year than they did in 2017 as a result of last year’s federal tax-code overhaul.
The cap is expected to affect those in high-income brackets the most. Thousands of New Jersey homeowners rushed to prepay their 2018 taxes in December to take advantage of bigger deductions on their 2017 returns before the cap took effect.
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ITEP Work in Action October 18, 2018 NJ Spotlight: New Jersey’s Tax System Ranked Among Fairest in the Country
A report on the fairness of state and local tax policy that was released yesterday by the Washington, D.C.-based Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy ranked New Jersey among the… -
media mention October 17, 2018 NJ BIZ: Report: NJ’s Top Earners Pay Lower Tax Share Than Middle-Income Families
New Jersey’s top earners enjoy vastly more wealth than the majority of New Jersey residents but pay a much lower percentage of taxes than middle-income families in the state. That’s according to a nationwide analysis released Wednesday by New Jersey Policy Perspective and the Institution of Taxation and Economic Policy.
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ITEP Work in Action October 17, 2018 Insider NJ: New Analysis: Middle Class Taxpayers in New Jersey Still Paying More Than Tax Rate Paid by Richest 1 Percent of New Jerseyans
A new study released today by the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy (ITEP) and New Jersey Policy Perspective (NJPP) finds that New Jersey’s middle class families pay more in taxes as a percent of their income compared to the state’s wealthiest residents.
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ITEP Work in Action June 28, 2018 Washington Post: N.J. Approaches a Government Shutdown as Democrats Feud Over Tax on Millionaires
New Jersey is just days away from a government shutdown over a plan to raise taxes on the rich that has divided Democrats and revealed the political difficulty of raising funds for the party’s ambitious social spending goals.
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ITEP Work in Action May 24, 2018 New Jersey Policy Perspective: Fast Facts: Proposed Tax Changes Would Bring More Balance to New Jersey’s Tax Code
The tax changes proposed in Gov. Murphy’s first budget would bring more balance to New Jersey’s tax code by raising taxes on the wealthiest one percent while reducing them for the lowest-income New Jerseyans.[1] Updating the tax code would also raise nearly $2 billion in new revenue for targeted investments in early education, public transit, health care and other essential public services.
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ITEP Work in Action May 15, 2018 New Jersey Policy Perspectives: DACA Recipients Contribute $59 Million Per Year in Taxes
The ITEP study found that New Jersey’s young immigrants eligible for DACA contribute $59 million in state and local taxes each year, the seventh highest level of all fifty states.… -
ITEP Work in Action April 16, 2018 New Jersey Policy Perspectives: Undocumented Immigrants Pay Taxes: County Breakdown of Taxes Paid
While undocumented immigrants in New Jersey now face greater threats from the federal government than ever before, new data at the state and county level released by the Institute on… -
ITEP Work in Action March 14, 2018 New Jersey Policy Perspective: Op-Ed: Tax Law Requires More Than ‘SALT Cap’ Workarounds
If you live in a high-wealth and high-tax state like New Jersey, the news gets worse. For the first time in 100 years, taxpayers may no longer deduct their full state and local taxes (“SALT” for short) from the income on which federal taxes are owed. The deductible ceiling is set at $10,000, so if you pay more than that with property and income taxes combined, your taxable income will increase by a bit.
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ITEP Work in Action February 14, 2018 New Jersey Policy Perspective: Op-Ed: How to Counter the GOP Tax Plan with Bold Action
The new federal tax law has generated a lot of press, sparked a fair amount of outrage and led many elected officials scrambling to respond with sound policies.
Unfortunately, there seems to be widespread confusion about the winners and losers under the new law – confusion that is complicating efforts to clean up New Jersey’s tax code and raise new resources to invest in critical public services.
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ITEP Work in Action January 25, 2018 NJPP: A Grain of ‘SALT’: New Jersey Needs More Than Workarounds to Respond to GOP Tax Plan
That’s because these workarounds would disproportionately benefit the wealthiest households in New Jersey, to make no mention of the fact that the Trump administration is unlikely to allow them to stand.
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ITEP Work in Action December 20, 2017 New Jersey Policy Perspectives: Failure to Act on DACA and Dream Act Would Harm New Jersey’s Tax Revenues
There are 53,000 young immigrants who were potentially eligible for DACA that call New Jersey home. They have attended our public schools, graduated high school and many have enrolled in… -
ITEP Work in Action September 15, 2017 New Jersey Policy Perspective: Reforming New Jersey’s Income Tax Would Help Build Shared Prosperity
Today, the most well-off New Jerseyans hold a greater share of the state’s income than they have in nearly a century, thanks to decades of unequal economic growth, creating an off-balance economy in which many middle- and lower-income New Jerseyans face barriers to economic opportunity. Recent tax policy changes have exacerbated this trend.
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ITEP Work in Action September 12, 2017 New Jersey Policy Perspective: Reforming New Jersey’s Income Tax Would Help Build Shared Prosperity
These reforms would also make New Jersey’s tax system more equitable, but it would not undo the tax code’s upside-down nature, in which low-income and middle-class New Jerseyans pay greater shares of their incomes to state and local taxes than wealthy residents. With these changes, this inequity would be slightly evened out. The share paid by the top 1 percent would rise to 7.7 percent from 7.1 percent, but that would still be lower than any other group of New Jersey families.
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ITEP Work in Action July 21, 2017 New Jersey Policy Perspectives: Trump Tax Plan: A Boon for the Wealthiest New Jerseyans
A federal tax package based on President Trump’s April outline would fail to deliver on its promise of mostly helping the middle class, instead showering most of its help to the richest 1 percent, according to a new 50-state analysis from the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy released today.
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ITEP Work in Action April 25, 2017 New Jersey Policy Perspectives: DACA-Eligible New Jerseyans Pay $66 Million a Year in Taxes
New Jersey’s young immigrants eligible for DACA (Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals) contribute $66 million in state and local taxes each year, the seventh highest level of all the states. And those annual contributions would increase by $27 million – the sixth most of all states – under comprehensive immigration reform.
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ITEP Work in Action April 3, 2017 New Jersey Policy Perspectives: Undocumented Residents Pay $587 Million a Year in NJ Taxes
New Jersey’s undocumented immigrants contribute $587 million in state and local taxes, the sixth highest level of all the states. And those contributions would increase by $73 million – the… -
ITEP Work in Action October 4, 2016 New Jersey Policy Perspectives: Transportation-Funding Deal Endangers New Jersey’s Future & Fails the ‘Tax Fairness’ Test
After a months-long stalemate, New Jersey’s three most powerful policymakers announced late last Friday that they’d come to an agreement on investing in the state’s transportation networks. As part of… -
ITEP Work in Action October 21, 2015 New Jersey Policy Perspective: Executive Actions on Immigration Would Help Many New Jerseyans While Boosting the Economy
President Obama’s 2014 executive actions on immigration would benefit hundreds of thousands of New Jerseyans and provide a boost to the state’s economy by allowing many undocumented residents to work… -
ITEP Work in Action October 21, 2015 New Jersey Policy Perspective: Levied on Very Few, New Jersey’s Estate and Inheritance Taxes Support Colleges, Health Care & Other Services
An effort by some lawmakers to eliminate or drastically cut taxes for a small number of New Jerseyans – a move that would deliver the greatest benefit to the state’s… -
ITEP Work in Action June 29, 2015 New Jersey Policy Perspective: Increasing the EITC Would Boost New Jersey’s Working Families
Increasing New Jersey’s Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) to 30 percent from 20 percent of the federal EITC would provide over half a million New Jersey working families with a… -
ITEP Work in Action April 29, 2015 New Jersey Policy Perspective: Failure to Address Gas Tax Costs New Jersey Over Half a Billion Dollars a Year
New Jersey is losing out on over $500 million each year by not tying increases in transportation construction costs to increases in gas tax rates, a new national report finds.…