Options to Limit the Benefit of Tax Expenditures for High-Income Households

by Daniel Baneman, Jim Nunns, Jeff Rohaly, Eric Toder, Roberton Williams

August 2, 2011 - A new study estimates the revenue and distributional impacts of three ways to limit tax expenditures for higher-income households: capping the value of their itemized deductions at 28 percent; imposing an effective minimum tax (EMT)equal to a percentage of income; and limiting the value of selected tax expenditures to two percent of adjusted gross income (AGI).

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Why Some Tax Units Pay No Income Tax

by Rachel M. Johnson, Jim Nunns, Jeff Rohaly, Eric Toder, Roberton Williams

July 27, 2011 - About 46 percent of American households will pay no federal individual income tax in 2011, roughly half of them because of structural features of the income tax that provide basic exemptions for subsistence level income and for dependents. The other half are nontaxable because tax expenditures— special provisions in the tax code that benefit selected taxpayers or activities—wipe out tax liabilities and, in the case of refundable credits, yield net payments from the government. Provisions that benefit senior citizens and low-income working families with children particularly affect households with income under $50,000 but other factors make higher-income households nontaxable.

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2010 Tax Policy Center Annual Report

Our 2010 Annual Report chronicles another very successful year for the Tax Policy Center.

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