• blog  December 20, 2018

    ITEP Winter Reading (and Listening) List

    It’s that time of year again. Members of Congress and the White House are negotiating the federal budget. Winter temperatures are unpredictable due to climate change. And news outlets, organizations and others are releasing end-of-year lists and the tax wonks at ITEP are joining the chorus. If you’re lucky enough to have some time off over the next couple of weeks or find yourself curling up on the couch this winter in need of a way to pass the time, the tax policy wonks at ITEP have compiled a winter reading/listening list that will appeal to wonks and non-wonks alike.

  • blog  December 19, 2018

    State Rundown 12/19: Time to Rest and Recharge for Big Year Ahead

    With many people enjoying time off over the next couple weeks, and the longest nights of the year coming over the weekend, now is a good time to get plenty of rest and relaxation in advance of what is likely to be a very busy 2019 for state fiscal policy and other debates. Among those debates, Kentucky lawmakers will be returning to topics they could not resolve in a brief special session held this week, New Jersey and New York will both be deciding how to legalize and tax cannabis, and gas tax updates will be on the agenda in Alabama and Illinois. Feel free to cozy up by the fire with some offerings from our “What We’re Reading” section, including eye-opening information on how much corporate subsidies are costing our schools and other services, what states are and should be doing to prepare for long-term needs and a potential recession, and hopeful guidance on how we can do more to stem inequality by strengthening taxes on unearned income like capital gains and inheritances. We at ITEP will be taking our own advice and resting next week, and look forward to returning with more state tax and budget news in the new year!

  • blog  December 17, 2018

    Five Things to Know on the One-Year Anniversary of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act

    While it has only been a year since passage of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA), it’s clear the law largely is both a debacle and a boondoggle. Below are the five takeaways about the legacy and continuing effect of the TCJA.

    1. The Tax Cuts and Jobs Act will substantially increase income, wealth, and racial inequality.
    2. The Tax Cuts and Jobs Act will continue to substantially increase the deficit.
    3. The Tax Cuts and Jobs Act is not significantly boosting growth or jobs.
    4. The Tax Cuts and Jobs Act continues to be very unpopular.
    5. Despite the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act’s lack of popularity and ill effects, many Republican lawmakers are calling for even more tax cuts for the wealthy and corporations.

  • blog  December 12, 2018

    End-of-Year Tax Measure Would Give Deficit-Financed Tax Cuts to Wealthy Families and Corporations

    Outgoing Ways and Means Chairman Rep. Kevin Brady (R-TX) today introduced legislation that includes $80 billion in tax cuts that are unpaid for and largely benefit the wealthy. The bill would, among its numerous provisions, expand retirement and education savings programs that offer very little value to low-income families, delay the Health Insurance Tax for an additional two years, and delay the Medical Device Tax for an additional five years.

  •  December 7, 2018

    Joint Letter: End the Tax Extenders Once And For All

    A joint letter to Congressional leadership and the heads of the taxwriting committees making the case that it is time to end the practice of enacting tax policy one year at a time.

  • blog  December 7, 2018

    Morgan Stanley Report Confirms Tax Cut Promises Made Are Promises Unkept

    Almost a year after lawmakers hastily enacted the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, evidence continues to mount that it is providing far more tax cuts…
  • report  December 6, 2018

    The Federal Estate Tax: An Important Progressive Revenue Source

    For years, wealth and income inequality have been widening at a troubling pace. One study estimated that the wealthiest 1 percent of Americans held 42 percent of the nation’s wealth in 2012, up from 28 percent in 1989. Lawmakers have exacerbated this trend by dramatically cutting federal taxes on inherited wealth, most recently by doubling the estate tax exemption as part of the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act. Further, lawmakers have done little to stop aggressive accounting schemes designed to avoid the estate tax altogether. This report explains how the percentage of estates subject to the federal estate tax has dropped dramatically from 2.16 percent in 2000 to just 0.06 percent in 2018, a 34-fold decrease in 19 years.

  • blog  December 5, 2018

    State Rundown 12/5: Familiar Questions Returning to Fore as 2019 Approaches

    State lawmakers are preparing their agendas for 2019 and looking at all sorts of tax and budget policies in the process, raising many familiar questions. Oregon legislators, for example, will try to fill in the blanks in a proposal to boost investments in education that left out detail on how to fund them, while their counterparts in Texas face the inverse problem of a proposed property tax cut that fails to clarify how schools could be protected from cuts. Similar school finance debates will play out in many other states. Alabama, Kansas, and Louisiana will look at gas tax updates, as Indiana and Mississippi will consider tobacco tax increases, and nearly every state has decisions to make about how to implement online sales taxes and what to do with the revenue.

  • blog  December 4, 2018

    Housing for All? Developers Bulldoze Taxpayers in Affordable Housing Debate

    Affordable housing advocates across the nation are attempting to address the problem at the local level, but they often face political and community opposition. These challenges are currently playing out in Baltimore, which is turning into a case study in how the best-planned civic interventions run into tough road blocks when it comes to tax increases versus moneyed special interest who seek to block those tax increases.

  • blog  November 29, 2018

    New Legislation Aims to Change Tax Law Provisions That Incentivize Outsourcing

    Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) and several Senate co-sponsors this week introduced the Removing Incentives for Outsourcing Act, which curbs harmful new incentives created by the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA) that encourage companies like GM to move their profits and operations offshore.