Steve Wamhoff
Steve Wamhoff is ITEP’s director of federal tax policy. In this role, he is responsible for setting the organization’s federal research and policy agenda. He is the author of numerous reports and analyses of federal tax policies as well as in-depth policy briefs that outline how the federal income tax and corporate tax code can be overhauled to improve tax fairness.
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blog December 8, 2022 Lawmakers Seek to Extend Tax Break for “Research” that Corporations Use to Develop Frozen Foods, New Beer Flavors, Casino Games and Tax Avoidance
If Congress creates a tax break to encourage businesses to conduct research that benefits society, should Netflix be eligible for it? There is no shame in binge-watching Stranger Things or… -
blog December 6, 2022 Reversing the Stricter Limit on Interest Deductions: Another Huge Tax Break for Private Equity
Private equity is doing fine on its own and does not need another tax break. Congress should keep the stricter limit on deductions for interest payments —one of the few provisions in the 2017 tax law that asked large businesses to pay a little bit more.
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blog December 5, 2022 Bipartisan Retirement Proposals Are Mostly Just More Tax Cuts for the Wealthy
The EARN Act and SECURE Act 2.0, two bipartisan retirement bills working their way through Congress, are major disappointments. They would mainly provide more tax breaks for the well-off who will most likely retire comfortably regardless of what policies Congress enacts. The bills would provide modest assistance for those who really need help to save.
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brief November 10, 2022 Twenty-Three Corporations Saved $50 Billion So Far Under Trump Tax Law’s “Bonus Depreciation” that Many Lawmakers Want to Extend
Nearly two dozen of America’s largest corporations together received roughly $50 billion in tax breaks from 2018 through 2021 under a Trump tax law provision that many lawmakers now want to extend. Corporate lobbyists are even asking Congress to extend this “accelerated depreciation” tax break as part of a possible year-end tax bill.
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media mention October 7, 2022 Financial Times: Wall Street Finds a Tax Silver Lining in Down Market
Wall Street banks have found a silver lining in this year’s market rout: making money by helping wealthy clients sell some investments at a loss to lighten their tax bills.… -
report October 4, 2022 Unfinished Tax Reform: Corporate Minimum Taxes
While the Inflation Reduction Act’s corporate minimum tax is a huge improvement in our tax system, implementing the global corporate minimum tax would improve it much more. And if other governments implement the global minimum tax, the United States will have an even stronger interest in joining them to ensure that new revenue collected from American corporations flows to the U.S. rather than to other countries.
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blog October 3, 2022 Congress Should Not Leave Children Out of Possible Year-End Tax Deal
If lawmakers believe it’s worthwhile to extend corporate tax breaks, then it would be entirely unreasonable for them to not conclude the same about tax provisions that help low-income children.
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blog September 13, 2022 Billionaires Should Pay Taxes on Their Income Every Year Like the Rest of Us
The Inflation Reduction Act signed by President Biden last month will crack down on corporate tax dodgers and strengthen enforcement of tax laws already on the books, raising hundreds of… -
blog September 7, 2022 Romney Child Tax Credit Plan Would Leave Millions of Children Worse Off and Raise Taxes for the Average Black Family
Sen. Romney’s plan would expand the Child Tax Credit and offset the costs by scaling back other tax benefits. All told, it would raise taxes on a fourth of all kids in the U.S. This includes about a fourth of the children among the poorest fifth of U.S. families.
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report September 7, 2022 National and State-by-State Estimates of Two Approaches to Expanding the Child Tax Credit
The Romney Child Tax Credit plan would leave a quarter of children worse off compared to current law and help half as many low-income children as the 2021 expansion of the credit.
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media mention August 19, 2022 Newsweek: Stimulus Check Update: Child Tax Credit Bill Faces Uphill Battle
Conversations on reviving the expanded child tax credit—which the White House credited as the main driver behind bringing child poverty to record lows in 2021—might not be finished yet. Read… -
media mention August 15, 2022 Marketwatch: Here’s How Private Equity Got Relief in Democrats’ Healthcare, Climate and Tax Package
The bipartisan duo of Sens. Kyrsten Sinema and John Thune helped private equity firms escape tens of billions of dollars in potential tax increases and instead walk away with relief… -
blog August 12, 2022 Lawmakers Must Choose Between Funding the IRS or Protecting Wealthy Tax Cheaters
Grasping for some way to criticize the popular Inflation Reduction Act as it approaches final passage, Congressional Republicans have decided to attack its provisions that will reverse a decade of… -
media mention August 11, 2022 Washington Post: With Sinema’s Help, Private Equity Firms Win Relief from Proposed Tax Hikes
Senate Democrats agreed Sunday to protect firms owned by the private equity industry from a new minimum tax on billion-dollar corporations, bowing to pressure from Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (D-Ariz.), who… -
blog August 9, 2022 What Tax Provisions are in the Senate-Passed Inflation Reduction Act?
The Inflation Reduction Act approved by the Senate on Aug. 7 would raise more than $700 billion in new revenue over a decade by closing corporate tax loopholes, empowering the… -
blog August 5, 2022 They Might Really Do It: The Senate Is About to Reform Our Tax Code
For now, the Senate is poised to reverse cuts to the IRS enforcement against wealthy tax evaders for the first time in a decade, crack down on tax-dodging by huge corporations for the first time since 1986, and finally address the method increasingly used by corporations to transfer income to shareholders to avoid federal taxes. The multi-decade winning streak of corporate lobbyists and special interests who have practically written many of our tax laws in recent years is about to come to an end.
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media mention August 2, 2022 Bloomberg Tax Op-Ed: Manchin-Schumer Deal Takes Sensible Aim at Corporate Tax Dodging
Revenue-raising provisions in the Inflation Reduction Act would bring long-overdue fairness to a tax system that for decades has been eroded by special breaks for the powerful and well-connected, says… -
blog August 2, 2022 Opponents of Inflation Reduction Act Call for Continued Tax Avoidance by Large Manufacturers
The biggest revenue-raising provision in the Inflation Reduction Act, the 15 percent minimum tax for corporations that have more than a billion dollars in profits, is under attack from members… -
blog August 2, 2022 Top Republican Tax-Writer Falsely Claims that Minimum Tax for Huge Corporations Is a Tax Hike on Middle-Class
Opponents of requiring corporations to pay even a minimum amount of taxes hold an unpopular position. But Sen. Mike Crapo, the top Republican on the Senate Finance Committee and a leader of that opposition, is using a one-sided and incomplete analysis to claim that the corporate minimum tax would raise taxes on low- and middle-income people.
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media mention July 28, 2022 The Washington Post: How the Schumer-Manchin Climate Bill Might Impact You and Change the U.S.
“This would certainly be the biggest corporate tax increase in decades,” said Steve Wamhoff, a tax expert at Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy. “We’ve had decades of tax policy… -
blog July 19, 2022 The Tax Legislation Debated in Congress Would Reduce Inflation and Help Americans Deal with Rising Costs
Opposing a fully paid-for spending bill because of inflation concerns does not make any sense. Opposing a deficit-reducing bill because of inflation is absurd.
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blog June 30, 2022 No Reason to Water Down the Tax Reforms in the Build Back Better Act
There is no justification for recently reported efforts to scale back the tax reforms in the Build Back Better Act, a bill passed by the House of Representatives in November… -
blog May 6, 2022 Most Senate Democrats Join Republicans in Calling for Corporate Tax Break
The vast majority of Senate Democrats joined their Republican colleagues in approving a new corporate tax break related to research in legislation that contains no offsetting corporate tax increases.
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media mention April 27, 2022 Bloomberg: Musk’s Untaxed Wealth Opens a Path to Twitter, Riling Democrats
“If you look at Musk’s ‘income’ as defined by our tax code, you see that the guy is really rich, but not rich enough to buy Twitter,” Steve Wamhoff, the… -
report April 26, 2022 Revenue-Raising Proposals in President Biden’s Fiscal Year 2023 Budget Plan
President Biden’s latest budget plan includes proposals that would raise $2.5 trillion in new revenue. While many of these reforms appeared in his previous budget, some of them are brand new, such as his proposal to prevent basis-shifting in partnerships and his Billionaires Minimum Income Tax.