The cost of gas is going up. To address this, policymakers have proposed suspending the gas tax. But could this actually make matters worse? We discuss why suspending the gas tax might be a mistake and what lawmakers could do to help with the rising costs of gas.
If policymakers are looking to change the tax code to help fight inflation, they should pump the brakes on the federal gas tax holiday and instead consider structural reforms to raise the economy’s productive capacity in the long term.
4 min read
By reducing the tax code’s current barriers to investment and saving and simplifying its complex rules, lawmakers would greatly enhance the ability of Americans to pursue new ideas, create more opportunities, and build financial security for themselves and their families.
40 min read
Tax extenders this year can be split into three rough groups: expiring parts of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA), expiring parts of various COVID-19 economic relief packages, and the Island of Misfit Extenders.
8 min read
Policymakers and taxpayers should understand the scope of tax changes necessary to fully pay for the large-scale social spending programs that would be initiated under the Build Back Better Act.
6 min read
Temporary tax relief measures, like refund checks or gas tax holidays, are not necessarily bad, and can be justified as ways to return excess revenues to taxpayers, but they often miss an opportunity to do better by taxpayers in the long run.
7 min read
Norway’s proposed reductions in income tax have the potential to increase disposable income for workers that can potentially raise consumption and contribute to economic growth. However, the increase of the wealth and indirect taxes is likely to step up the complexity of the tax system and create additional distortions.
3 min read
Austria should not shy from lowering the corporate income tax rate sooner or even implementing a more ambitious tax reform to improve its tax competitiveness and contribute to greater economic growth.
3 min read
One of the Senate’s proposals to pay for the Build Back Better Act is a federal excise tax on virgin plastics, which are plastics that are not reprocessed or recovered.
4 min read
A carbon tax would be a less economically harmful pay-for than either personal or corporate income tax hikes and a more efficient way to reduce carbon emissions than green energy tax credits, but would come with other trade-offs.
4 min read
The Biden administration does have a point about how some components of the infrastructure bill could put downward pressure on inflation in the long term. However, the taxes chosen to pay for those investments would counteract those effects, by reducing investment and productivity growth.
4 min read
Congressional lawmakers are putting together a reconciliation bill to enact much of President Biden’s Build Back Better agenda. Many lawmakers including Senate Finance Committee Chair Ron Wyden (D-OR), however, want to make their own mark on the legislation.
5 min read
Tackling climate change and shifting the economy towards renewable energy has been a key part of the Biden administration’s agenda. However, this effort must first confront an overly complicated and non-neutral tax code, particularly in how it treats nuclear energy, for the White House to reach its ambitious goals.
6 min read
While it makes sense to ensure cryptocurrency transactions are treated similarly to other financial assets, the nature of these requirements as written are potentially unworkable.
3 min read
A vehicle miles traveled (VMT) proposal gaining steam in Pennsylvania would be the equivalent of a state gas tax of more than $2 per gallon, and that’s not all the Commonwealth is considering.
7 min read
The good news is that lawmakers avoided raising taxes to cover the cost of the new spending and instead used some reasonable fees and asset sales. The bad news is that half of the offsets come from unused, debt-financed COVID-19 relief funds and the economic return on many of these investments is questionable.
7 min read
As lawmakers explore funding mechanisms for additional federal infrastructure investment, they should focus on permanent, sustainable, and transparent revenue options that conform to the benefit principle. Permanent user fees, appropriately adjusted to restore and maintain their purchasing power, would serve as ideal revenue sources for federal infrastructure investments.
5 min read