North Carolina, one of six states where teachers held strikes before school let out last spring, “is an example of how lawmakers have prioritized tax cuts for corporations and the wealthy over public services,” says Meg Wiehe, deputy director of the Washington, DC-based Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy, and a North Carolina resident. “The big tax-cutting spree started here in 2013, and they’ve continued cutting.”
Select Media Mentions
Members of the media rely on ITEP for analysis and insight about how tax policies affect people. If you’re a reporter looking to talk to one of our experts, contact Jon Whiten at [email protected].
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media mention October 22, 2018 Christian Science Monitor: A New Candidate Class: Schoolteachers Running For Office
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media mention October 19, 2018 Governing: The Week in Public Finance: Most States’ Tax Systems Worsen Income Inequality
Some people pay more than their fair share of taxes — and it’s not the rich.
According to a new report by the progressive-leaning Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy (ITEP), the lowest-income households pay 50 percent more, on average, of their income in state and local taxes than the wealthiest. That leads to worsening inequality in four out of every five states.
“While state and local taxes can’t eliminate income inequality, well-designed systems can help lessen the problem,” says Meg Wiehe, ITEP’s deputy director. “Meanwhile, it’s clear that steeply regressive systems only make it worse.”
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media mention October 18, 2018 Chicago Tribune: A Key Issue in Illinois Governor Race — Gov. Bruce Rauner, J.B. Pritzker Have Very Different Plans for State Income Tax
Last year, state lawmakers raised income taxes and ended the state’s two-year budget impasse over the passionate objections and veto of Rauner. At the time, the governor called the move “another step in Illinois’ never-ending tragic trail of tax hikes.”
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media mention October 18, 2018 U.S. News and World Report: Study: Residents With Lower Incomes Pay a Higher Effective Tax Rate
States and localities are filling their coffers by disproportionately burdening lower-income residents, who are taxed at a higher effective rate than top earners, according to a study released Wednesday by a tax policy group.
The 50-state analysis by the nonpartisan Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy found that the lower one’s income, the higher the effective overall state and local tax rate. The study includes sales taxes, excise taxes, user fees and income taxes. In fact, states which boast low income taxes are often the most likely to have systems that end up shifting the fiscal burden to lower-income residents, Carl Davis, one of the authors of the study, told reporters in a conference call.
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media mention October 18, 2018 Associated Press: Kansas Governor’s Race is Referendum on Notorious Tax Cuts
The argument over taxes is likely to dominate the campaign’s final weeks; it is playing out in television ads and was a persistent theme Tuesday. Tax cuts appeal to voters… -
media mention October 18, 2018 The Pitt News: Editorial: Riding High: United States Should Follow Canada’s Pot Legalization
“We don’t know the size of the marijuana market right now,” Carl Davis, senior analyst at the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy told The Huffington Post. “But we do know that legalization would lead to a positive revenue impact on the income and sales tax side.”
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media mention October 18, 2018 Bloomberg: States Could Feel Conservative Tax Pinch Even If Blue Wave Wins
Opponents say such restrictions are a recipe for political paralysis or deep budget cuts the next time the economy lapses into a recession.
“It restricts future lawmakers — even next year or in five years or ten years — from making fiscally responsible decisions,” said Meg Wiehe, deputy director of the left-leaning Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy. “Whoever is in charge of the state should be able to make decisions that are best for the state at that time.”
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media mention October 18, 2018 The Atlantic: Kamala Harris’s Trump-Size Tax Plan
An analysis of Harris’s proposal by the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy finds it to be roughly the same size as the Trump tax cuts. But the average family in the bottom income quintile will see $100 in benefits from Trump’s tax initiative as of 2019, with the average family in the middle getting $800 in benefits and $55,190 for those in in the top 1 percent. In contrast, Harris’s legislation would have families in the bottom and middle of the income distribution benefit by $2,000 on average, with no effect on those at the top.
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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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media mention October 17, 2018 KUOW: Washington State Tops ‘Terrible Ten’ List for Taxes
Washington State’s tax system is widening the gap between the rich and the poor. That’s according to the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy (ITEP) based in Washington, D.C.
“What you see is that Washington’s tax system couldn’t possibly be further from hitting people evenly,” Carl Davis said. “People are having to devote very different shares of their household budgets to funding state and local government.”
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media mention October 17, 2018 Topeka-Capital Journal: New Study: Kansas’ Tax Policy Ranks as 23rd Most Regressive in the Nation
A 50-state study of tax systems found Kansas’ lowest-income residents pay 1.5 times more in taxes as a percent of income compared with the wealthiest residents, ranking the state 23rd in the nation on an equity index.
“State lawmakers have control over how their tax systems are structured,” said Meg Wiehe, the institute’s deputy director and a study author. “They can and should enact more equitable tax policies that raise adequate revenue in a fair, sustainable way.”
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media mention October 16, 2018 The American Prospect: Think the GOP Tax Cut Was for the Rich? Actually, It Was for the White and Rich.
The $1.5 trillion tax cut signed into law last December by President Trump is not only widening the economic gap between the rich and everyone else, but also between white Americans and people of color.
That’s according to a new, first-of-its-kind analysis of the 2017 Republican Tax Act by the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy (ITEP) and Prosperity Now, a nonprofit advocacy group for low-income households. Using an economic model created by ITEP, the report drills down on the racial implications of the Republicans’ handiwork. The report’s authors found that racial inequities are a feature of the tax law, not a bug—Trump’s tax cuts champion Americans with existing wealth over those struggling to create new wealth.
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media mention October 16, 2018 Truthout: North Carolina Ballot Initiative Would Enshrine Tax Cuts for the Rich
“Since 2012, when Republicans took full control of the legislature and governorship for the first time in modern history, they’ve been on a tax cutting rampage,” said Meg Wiehe, a North Carolina native and deputy director of the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy. “The state will be about $3.6 billion shorter in revenue than it would have been otherwise, which is a pretty significant difference in a state with a general fund of just around $21 billion.”
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media mention October 16, 2018 Pod Save the People: Flint: Lead & Beyond
DeRay, Brittany, Sam and Clint discuss the overlooked news, including the decline of U.S. prison populations, how American abortion policies affect women around the world, the death penalty, and who benefits from President Trump’s tax cuts. (Podcast)
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media mention October 15, 2018 Law360: State Tax Codes Can Help Mitigate Poverty
State lawmakers have a tremendous opportunity to combat poverty with smart tax policies that can improve the lives of millions. Specifically, refundable tax credits for low-income workers and their families can play a role in positioning the nation’s most vulnerable families for success. Tax credits are also a vital tool for mitigating the upside-down nature of most state and local tax systems, which take a greater share of income from low- and middle-income families than from wealthy families. They are also especially important at a time when many federal lawmakers are determined to dismantle the safety net creating even more barriers to opportunity.
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media mention October 13, 2018 Mother Jones: A New Study Shows White Families Getting Four-Fifths of Trump’s Tax Cut
“Households of color have less income and have less wealth than white households, in large part due to centuries of systemic racism,” says Meg Wiehe, ITEP’s deputy director and one of the report’s authors. “So inevitably a tax cut that’s so expensive and so tilted to the top is furthering not just income inequality—it’s also furthering racial inequity in income and in wealth.”
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media mention October 12, 2018 Orlando Sentinel: Commentary: Vote No On Amendment 5: Allows a Few to Thwart the Needs of Many
This amendment would lock in tax breaks and loopholes for the wealthy and large corporations, making our tax system even more unfair than it is now. The nonpartisan Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy reports that only one state ranks lower in terms of the fairness of its tax system. Floridians who make $17,000 pay nearly 13 percent of their income in state and local taxes, and those who make more than $489,000 pay less than 2 percent. Amendment 5 would permanently enshrine this discrimination in our Constitution.
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media mention October 12, 2018 PolitiFact: Do Trump Tariffs Cost More Than Affordable Care Act Taxes?
Matt Gardner, a senior fellow at the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy, added that regardless of imports volume, we don’t know how they will get passed through by the companies paying them, either. And not everyone has to pay them — consumers could simply redirect their demand.
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media mention October 12, 2018 WBOC16: Incorporating in Delaware: The Perks and Pitfalls
Some critics of Delaware LLCs say until Delaware’s corporate code is adjusted, criminal activity will continue to exist in Delaware’s corporations. Matthew Gardner, a senior fellow at the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy, authored a report entitled “Delaware: An Onshore Tax Haven.”
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media mention October 12, 2018 The Guardian: I’m Undocumented. It’s Time to Reveal What That Actually Means
Nationwide, the amount of taxes that the Internal Revenue Service collects from undocumented workers ranges from almost $2.2m in Montana, which has an estimated undocumented population of 4,000, to more than $3.1bn in California, which is home to more than 3 million undocumented immigrants. According to the non-partisan Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy, undocumented immigrants nationwide pay an estimated 8% of their incomes in state and local taxes on average. To put that in perspective, the top 1% of taxpayers pay an average nationwide effective tax rate of just 5.4%.
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media mention October 11, 2018 TalkPoverty: North Carolina Legislators Want to Add Tax Breaks for the Rich to the State Constitution
“Since 2012, when Republicans took full control of the legislature and governorship for the first time in modern history, they’ve been on a tax cutting rampage,” said Meg Wiehe, a North Carolina native and deputy director of the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy. “The state will be about $3.6 billion shorter in revenue than it would have been otherwise, which is a pretty significant difference in a state with a general fund of just around $21 billion.”
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media mention October 11, 2018 Law360: TCJA Increases Racial, Economic Tax Divides, Report Says
The recent federal tax overhaul disproportionately benefits white households over households of color, increasing the wealth gap not just along income lines but along racial lines as well, according to a…
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media mention October 11, 2018 New York Times: White Americans Gain the Most From Trump’s Tax Cuts, a Report Finds
The tax cuts that President Trump signed into law last year are disproportionately helping white Americans over African-Americans and Latinos, a disparity that reflects longstanding racial economic inequality in the United States and the choices that Republicans made in crafting the law.
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media mention October 5, 2018 NPR: It’s Been 25 Years Since The Federal Gas Tax Went Up
Yet over those 25 years, the cost of building and maintaining roads, bridges and transit has shot up, leaving the highway trust fund, which pays the federal portion of highway and transit projects, running on empty.
“The whole reason this tax exists is to keep our roads paved and to keep our bridges from falling down,” says Davis. “And to do that effectively, it needs to collect a sustainable amount of revenue over time to cover the cost of paving roads and maintaining bridges, and it can’t do that if it’s just not updated for decades at a time.”
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media mention October 4, 2018 Washington Post: How big developers like Trump benefit from web of tax breaks
[Real estate investors] can fall behind on their debts and still face fewer tax penalties for having the debt forgiven than other kinds of investors, according to Steve Wamhoff, director of federal tax policy at the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy. Trump took advantage of that, Wamhoff says, when he couldn’t repay debts on his Atlantic City casinos in the 1990s and early 2000s.