Tax Policy 101

Everyone can benefit from learning more about the taxes we pay and their impact on the world around us. Unfortunately, tax policy can be complex. Our goal is to make sure understanding it isn’t.

TaxEDU’s Tax Policy 101 form a comprehensive crash course ready for the classroom and designed to be accessible to anyone interested in raising their tax literacy, from students to legislative staff. These resources include:

  • Primers: downloadable resources to enhance your understanding of different tax types, how taxes influence behavior, and other basic tax policy information.
  • Explainer Videos: 60-90 second videos designed to be used in the classroom and shared across social media platforms as an accessible way to boost your tax literacy.
  • Case Studies: downloadable tools for policy and business professors to help their students take a deep dive into important tax policy concepts and connect them to real-world outcomes.

For more information about the principles that guide sound tax policy and all Tax Foundation analysis, click here.

Jump to Primers

Jump to Videos

Jump to Case Studies

Jump to Lesson Plans

Featured Primers

The Three Basic Tax Types

Taxes: The Price We Pay for Government

Not All Taxes Are Created Equal

Common Tax Questions, Answered

The Weird Way Taxes Impact Behavior

10 Common Tax Myths, Debunked

History of Taxes

Featured Videos

How Do Tax Brackets Work?

Understanding how tax brackets work can inform decisions about performing extra work through a second job or overtime, or pursuing new streams of income.

Tariffs Are Taxes Too

Even though tariffs are invisible, their effects clearly are not. They might be sold as a tool to strengthen the economy, but tariffs are just taxes that make everyone worse off.

A Carbon Tax, Explained

Every policy has trade-offs, but a well-designed carbon tax has the potential to protect the environment without harming consumers, jobs, or businesses.

Green Rush: Principles for Taxing Cannabis

Taxing cannabis is brand-new territory. While many states see recreational cannabis as a potential gold mine for tax revenue, the reality of designing a new tax is more complicated.

Who Bears the Burden of the Corporate Income Tax?

Raising the corporate income tax is often promoted as a way to generate revenue for helpful government services. Unfortunately, higher corporate taxes typically hurt the very people they’re supposed to help through lost wages and fewer opportunities.

The Three Basic Tax Types

The better you understand taxes, the better equipped you are to make decisions about them. All taxes can be divided into three basic types: taxes on what you buy, taxes on what you earn, and taxes on what you own.

Going Beyond the Headlines: Understanding Corporate Taxes

Every so often, you will see headlines highlighting large companies that pay little or no corporate income tax. While these stories may seem shocking, the reality is much more mundane.

GILTI: Foreign Tax, Local Impact

GILTI is broken. It doesn’t just tax IP, and it doesn’t just tax businesses that are looking to shift their profits into low-tax countries. GILTI unintentionally places a surtax on many U.S. companies that want to reach customers overseas.

Featured Case Studies

Case Study: Sales Taxes vs. Excise Taxes

Case Study: Cutting Corporate Taxes

Case Study: Taxing a New Industry

Case Study: Global Tax Deal

Case Study: Average vs. Marginal Tax Rates

Featured Lesson Plans

Lesson Plan: The Three Basic Tax Types

Lesson Plan: Not All Taxes Are Created Equal

Lesson Plan: Average vs. Marginal Tax Rates

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TaxEDU was made possible thanks to the generous support of the Stiles-Nicholson Foundation.