Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy

ITEP Work in Action

North Carolina Budget & Tax Center: NC Leaders Are Shirking Their Responsibilities To Our Children, Our State by Revisiting Leandro Lawsuit

November 17, 2023

The announcement that the NC Supreme Court will rehear the court case that affirmed children’s constitutional right to a sound, basic education is just another way in which North Carolina’s legislative leaders are attempting to rewrite the rules to further their agenda rather than the well-being of children. Read more.

North Carolina Budget & Tax Center: Tax Changes in NC Senate Budget Plan Benefit Richest, Worsen Racial Inequities

May 25, 2023

The NC Senate tax plan will double down on the path to zero income tax — keeping in place the elimination of the corporate income tax and reducing the personal income tax to 2.49 percent after 2029 — to benefit the very wealthy and profitable corporations. Read more.

North Carolina Budget & Tax Center: Missing the Mark for North Carolina

September 28, 2022

Inflation isn’t just a pocketbook problem, it’s a budget problem as well. Governments feel the pinch of gas prices climbing higher, food becoming more expensive, and increased competition from private sector employers as well as most of the impacts of inflation that affect consumers and businesses. Unfortunately, the 2022-23 budget allows inflation to undermine the […]

North Carolina Policy Watch: NC House Tax Plan Isn’t Good for Our State (And These Graphs Explain Why This Is the Case)

August 10, 2021

The House tax plan would deliver the greatest share of the net tax cut to the richest North Carolinians. Fifty-six percent of the net tax cut would go to the richest 20 percent in North Carolina. During the House Finance debate, proponents of the tax plan suggested that North Carolinians with poverty-level incomes would see […]

North Carolina Policy Watch: NC’s Tax Code Reinforces Racial Exclusion; Senate’s Proposed Budget Would Make Matters Worse

July 30, 2021

When one applies a unique tool developed by the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy to assess the racial and ethnic impact of the budget proposal approved by the state Senate in June (SB 105), it becomes clear that the proposed income tax reductions will worsen the state’s exclusionary tax code. This analysis should serve […]

North Carolina Justice Center: Five Takeaways from the Senate’s Budget Proposal

June 23, 2021

The Senate’s budget plan would bring the state’s investments to a new low while committing the state to untold losses in the form of revenue reductions by eliminating income taxes for profitable corporations by 2028 and lowering the already flat (read: regressive) personal income tax rate. Read more

NC Policy Watch: NC needs to fix its tax code to secure a just recovery — for everyone

April 23, 2021

North Carolina’s current tax code asks the top to pay less as a share of their income than taxpayers with poverty-level incomes. By putting in place tax policies that would ask just 1 percent of North Carolinians to pay slightly more, North Carolina can invest in a more equitable, just recovery for everyone. Read more

NC Policy Watch: Some simple truths about the taxes corporations pay and Biden’s proposal blow the whistle on them

April 14, 2021

Discovery No. 1 one is that almost no major U.S. corporation, certainly not those that do business overseas, actually pays the 21% corporate tax rate, set by law. In fact, on average, Fortune 500 companies pay about half that much – 11.3% according to the non-profit Institute for Taxation and Economic Policy and Taxation, working […]

NC Policy Watch: New report: NC tax policy promotes racial inequities in numerous ways

April 14, 2021

North Carolina’s tax code and budget are wrought with such policy choices, which can result in racist outcome that worsen barriers to well-being for people and communities of color, according to new data from the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy (ITEP). The greater tax load carried by Black, Indigenous, and Latinx residents has been […]

North Carolina Justice Center: State Tax Policy Is Not Race Neutral

April 13, 2021

North Carolina’s tax code and budget are wrought with such policy choices, which can result in racist outcomes that worsen barriers to well-being for people and communities of color, according to new data from the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy (ITEP). The greater tax load carried by Black, Indigenous, and Latinx residents has been […]

Washington State Budget and Policy Center: It’s time to include undocumented immigrants in state response to COVID-19

May 21, 2020

In addition to state and local taxes, new estimates show that the labor of undocumented workers in Washington state has resulted in nearly $400 million of contributions to the state and federal unemployment trust fund over the past ten years. Yet these workers are systematically denied protection when they become unemployed. Read more

NC Policy Watch: Those Federal COVID-19 Checks: What They Mean and Who Might Get Left Out

April 2, 2020

In a replay of how aid checks were dispensed during the Great Recession, the CARES Act reveals giant holes in how we get cash to people in desperate need. Without federal, state, and local policy action, many of the North Carolinians who need aid most urgently will be the last to get it or won’t […]

Budget & Tax Center: A Costly Cover for More Business Tax Cuts in NC

October 25, 2019

Analysis from the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy shows that 27 percent of the total net tax cut from the increase in the standard deduction will actually go to the top 20 percent, while just 7 percent will go to the bottom 20 percent whose income leaves them in poverty each year. Read more

North Carolina Justice Center: Higher Rates on Higher Income: Why a Graduated Income Tax is Good Policy for North Carolina

March 20, 2019

At the same time, a graduated rate structure — in contrast with the state’s current flat tax rate on income — can make more revenue available for key public investments, generating broad-based benefits to many people and communities. It is also better able to keep up with the needs of a growing state. That is […]

NC Policy Watch: Report: Corporations Are Stiffing North Carolina on $373 Million in State Taxes

January 23, 2019

It turns out that state leaders can ensure that companies pay the proper amount of taxes on income generated from business conducted in their jurisdictions, but existing tax codes at the state level often allow loopholes for smart corporate tax lawyers to exploit. Corporations often use accounting sleights of hand to move income around within […]

NC Policy Watch: North Carolina’s Tax Code Isn’t Helping the State’s Growing Inequality

October 22, 2018

Despite claims by the architects of North Carolina’s failed tax-cut experiment, policy choices since 2013 have not ensured that middle and low-income taxpayers are paying lower shares of their income in state and local taxes. Instead the richest taxpayers—whose average income is more than $1 million—continue to pay 33 percent less in state and local taxes as a share of their income than taxpayers who have averages incomes annually of $11,000, a threshold that aligns with deep poverty.

NC Policy Watch: Low-income Tax Payers in NC Pay More of Their Income in State and Local Taxes Each Year Than the Richest Taxpayers

October 17, 2018

Sales taxes play a critical role in the regressive and consequently inequitable nature of the North Carolina tax system. Like most other states, North Carolina relies on sales and excise taxes (30.7% of the 2018-2019 approved budget) as a primary mechanism to raise revenue. However, in North Carolina, sales and excise taxes are the most regressive taxes when compared to income and property taxes. The lowest 20% of North Carolina workers pay 6.1 percent in sales taxes as a percentage of their income while the top 1 percent pays less than 1 percent in sales taxes as a percentage of…

BTC Report: Income tax rate cap amendment is costly for taxpayers, communities

September 28, 2018

Imposing an arbitrary income tax cap in the North Carolina Constitution could fundamentally compromise our state’s ability to fund our schools, roads, and public health, as well as raise the cost of borrowing. This could all happen even as the tax load shifts even further onto middle- and low-income taxpayers and the state’s highest income taxpayers — the top 1 percent — continue to benefit from recent tax changes since 2013.

WRAL: Meg Wiehe: Capping North Carolina’s top income tax rate isn’t good for our communities

September 4, 2018

ITEP Deputy Director Meg Wiehe writes for WRAL.com that it would be unwise to constitutionally cap the North Carolina state income tax rate, pointing out that school funding in the state is already down and faltering revenues in other states have led to teacher pay crises and strikes. 

NC Budget and Tax Center: Corporations over Carolinians?

May 31, 2018

Big corporations and wealthy executive have been on quite a run. Corporate profits are at historic levels,[1] stock prices are through the roof, and plush executive pay has become the norm. At the same time, corporate taxes have been slashed both here in North Carolina starting in 2013 and last December at the federal level. […]

NC Budget and Tax Center: Revenue Options to Support Children’s Educational Success

May 30, 2018

The General Assembly legislative session begins on May 16, the same day teachers plan a day of action to highlight the unmet needs their students face in the classroom and their communities. While the evidence is quite clear that supporting children’s educational success can generate lifelong benefits for families and the broader economy[1], the NC […]

NC Policy Watch: Governor Cooper recognizes North Carolina is in a hole, stops digging

May 22, 2018

Holding off on another round of tax cuts for the richest taxpayers and profitable corporations and keeping the increased standard deduction and lower rate for the majority of taxpayers will reduce the tax cuts given to the top 5 percent of taxpayers since 2013. Read more here

North Carolina Justice Center: New Report Looks at How Corporate Tax Cuts Have Hurt North Carolina

May 21, 2018

A new report on corporate income taxes looks at how corporate taxes have been slashed at the state and federal levels, provides evidence that wealthy shareholders are the prime beneficiaries of corporate tax cuts, and shows that corporate tax cuts have not solved North Carolina’s most pressing economic problems. Unless leaders in Raleigh change course, corporations could be in line for yet another tax cut next year if a rate cut to the corporate income tax moves ahead as currently scheduled.

NC Budget and Tax Center: North Carolina’s Upside Down Tax Code

April 16, 2018

Tax season comes to a close this week, and Tax Day serves as a good time to reflect on who pays taxes in North Carolina. The income tax is, naturally, at the foremost of our minds, but often ignored as one of the best tools to align our tax code with taxpayers’ ability to contribute […]

CBPP: North Carolina Tax Cuts Have Worsened Racial Wealth Inequities

February 27, 2018

The top 1 percent of North Carolinians are getting about $21,780 in average tax breaks per year — 59 times the average break for people in the middle fifth of the income scale and 1,361 times the average break for people in the lowest fifth, the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy found in its analysis of the 2013 tax changes.