Dive into the highlights from the DNC as we break down Vice President Kamala Harris’s tax proposals and their potential impact on everyday families. What do higher taxes on businesses and the wealthy mean for working Americans?
The recently released FY 2025 budget for New York State signals a degree of optimism, with caveats. New York cannot tax itself toward a balanced budget.
6 min read
To encourage greater saving, the US federal income tax provides tax-neutral treatment to some types of saving through a variety of accounts. The type of tax treatment, contribution limits, withdrawal rules, and use cases for contributions all vary by account, leading to a complicated system for households to navigate.
11 min read
Short FormWith pandemic-era savings now fully depleted and the majority of Americans pointing to their finances as their biggest source of stress, one thing is clear: the US needs policies that help people save more.
4 min read
The government provides various services at the federal, state, and local levels. How are they paid for? Taxes.
Not every change in the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act simplified the tax code. However, the TCJA reduced compliance costs overall for individual filers, and allowing fundamental structural improvements to expire would make the tax code worse.
5 min read
Gov. Walz’s tax policy record is notable because of how much it contrasts with broader national trends. In recent years, most governors have championed tax cuts. Walz, rare among his peers, chose tax increases.
5 min read
Americans will spend more than 7.9 billion hours complying with IRS tax filing and reporting requirements in 2024. This is equal to 3.8 million full-time workers doing nothing but tax return paperwork—roughly equal to the population of Los Angeles.
7 min read
Exempting Social Security benefits from income tax would increase the budget deficit by about $1.6 trillion over 10 years, accelerate the insolvency of the Social Security and Medicare trust funds, and create a new hole in the income tax without a sound policy rationale.
6 min read
Short FormThe 2024 Summer Olympics are underway, drawing the attention of billions and continuing a tradition dating back thousands of years. But you know what else originated thousands of years ago and affects even more people? Taxes.
3 min read
Next year, West Virginians will see an income tax cut thanks to revenue triggers in a 2023 law. The Mountain State joins 14 other states that have cut income taxes this year.
4 min read
While both President Biden and Vice President Harris aim their proposed tax hikes on businesses and high earners, key differences between their tax ideas in the past reveal where Harris may take her tax policy platform in the 2024 campaign.
6 min read
“No tax on tips” might be a catchy idea on the campaign trail. But it could create plenty of headaches, from figuring out tips on previously untipped services to an unexpectedly large loss of federal revenue.
6 min read
From President Biden calling the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act the “largest tax cut in American history,” to former President Trump claiming that Biden “wants to raise your taxes by four times,” the campaign rhetoric on taxes may be sparking some confusion.
5 min read
The Fifth Circuit has affirmed states’ authority over their respective tax policies and has asserted that the offset clause—often called the “Tax Mandate”—of the American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) has enough fiscal impact on a state’s budget so as to be coercive, as opposed to incentivizing.
5 min read
The proposal is a good example of what can be done to reduce tax burdens on residents if spending is constrained. There are real, tangible benefits associated with enacting this pro-growth reform that should not be discounted.
5 min read
As members of Congress prepare to address the expiration of the TCJA, they should appreciate how revenues have evolved since 2017.
4 min read
While neither full expiration nor a deficit-financed full extension of the TCJA would be appropriate, lawmakers should consider the incentive effects of whichever tax reform they pursue. Because taxes affect the economy, they also affect the sustainability of debt reduction.
3 min read
Governor Sarah Huckabee Sanders (R) recently called a brief special legislative session to enact the fourth round of reductions to the Natural State’s individual and corporate income taxes. Legislators also passed a modest property tax reform proposal.
4 min read
The European Union’s experience with high inflation highlights the critical need for adaptive fiscal policies. Best practices drawn from the academic literature recommend implementing automatic adjustment mechanisms with a certain periodicity and based on price increases.
31 min read