Newsletter Archive

April 7, 2005

See below for the latest from the Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center:

• Options to Reform the Estate Tax
  (TPC Issues and Options Brief number 10)
  Leonard E. Burman, William G. Gale and Jeff Rohaly
  March 2005
• Demythologizing the Russian Flat Tax
  (Tax Notes International)
  Vivian Gabor and William G. Gale
  March 14, 2005
• Sisyphus Had it Easy: Reflections on Tax and Budget Reform
  (The Milken Institute Review)
  Eugene Steuerle
  January 2005

Options to Reform the Estate Tax
(TPC Issues and Options Brief number 10)
Leonard E. Burman, William G. Gale and Jeff Rohaly
March 2005

Retargeting the estate tax to very wealthy households and lowering its rates would blunt much of the criticism against it while retaining many of its advantages. This brief explains how the estate tax works and examines who is affected by it under current law. It discusses how reform would affect tax revenues, the distribution of tax burdens, farms and small businesses, and charitable giving and bequests. A concluding section discusses ways to reduce the tax's complexity.

Demythologizing the Russian Flat Tax
(Tax Notes International)
Vivian Gabor and William G. Gale
March 14, 2005

On January 1, 2001, Russia introduced what has frequently been called a flat tax. Over the next several years, the country's tax revenue and GDP grew dramatically. Some commentators claim those two sets of events were causally related (Mitchell, 2003). Others just link the two repeatedly, being careful never to explicitly assert causation (Rabushka, 2002, for example). In the United States, supporters of the Hall-Rabushka (1995) flat tax often refer to the Russian example as evidence in their favor. In this paper, we examine the limited research and information available on the effects of Russia's personal income tax reform and reach five principal conclusions.

Sisyphus Had it Easy: Reflections on Tax and Budget Reform
(The Milken Institute Review)
Eugene Steuerle
January 2005

In the heady days after his re-election, President Bush promised to replace the current tax system with something better. Politicians often delude themselves that reform can be summoned by proclamation. But, a wholesale transformation of the income tax system isn't about to happen quickly or painlessly. In fact, only painstaking bottom-up planning could do the trick.

For more on the Perspectives on Tax Reform series, visit http://www.taxpolicycenter.org/newsevents/events_prelude_series.

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