Tax Policy in the Obama Era

Sponsored by the UCLA School of Law and the Tax Policy Center

Friday, January 30, 2009, 8:30 am – 5:15 pm • UCLA School of Law, Room 1447

Live webcast will be available on January 30, 2009.

Please RSVP to estrada@law.ucla.edu by Monday, January 26, 2009

8:30 am - 9:00 am Check-In and Continental Breakfast

9:00 am - 9:15 am Welcome and Introductory Remarks

9:15 am - 10:45 am Tax Policy in an Era of Growing Inequality

Emmanuel Saez, UC Berkeley Economics Department, Income Tax Reform and Inequality

Leonard Burman, Tax Policy Center, The Rising Tide Tax System: Indexing the Tax System for Changes in Inequality

Eric Zolt, UCLA School of Law & Leah Boustan, UCLA Economics Department, Income Inequality and Local Government

Commentator: Elizabeth Garrett, University of Southern California

10:45 am - 11:00 am Break

11:00 am - 12:30 pm Dimensions of Fiscal Policy in the Post-Bush Era

George Yin, University of Virginia School of Law, Temporary-Effect Legislation, Political Accountability, and Fiscal Restraint

Hillary Hoynes, UC Davis Economics Department, Tax Policy for Low-Income Families: The EITC

Kirk Stark, UCLA School of Law, In Search of a Post-Partisan Fiscal Federalism

Commentator: Pamela Olson, Skadden Arps

12:30 pm - 2:00 pm Lunch Speaker:The Honorable Rep. Xavier Becerra United States House of Representatives Member of the Committee on Ways and Means

2:00 pm - 3:30 pm Policy Options Amid Economic Crisis

Steve Bank, UCLA School of Law, Tax Policy During the Great Depression

Dan Halperin, Harvard Law School & Tax Policy Center, Retirement Income Security After the Fall

Daniel J. B. Mitchell, UCLA Anderson School of Management, When Luck Runs Out: California’s Budget Crisis

Commentator: Joseph Bankman, Stanford Law School

3:30 pm - 3:45 pm Break

3:45 pm - 5:15 pm Politics, Public Opinion & the Possibility of Tax Reform

Larry Bartels, Princeton University, Public Opinion and the Politics of Tax Policy: From Bush to Obama

Ed McCaffery, USC School of Law & California Institute of Technology, Behavioral Dimensions of Tax Reform

Rosanne Altshuler, Tax Policy Center, Lessons from the President's Advisory Panel on Federal Tax Reform

Commentator: Ellen Aprill, Loyola Law School

For directions, parking, availability of MCLE credit and other information about the conference, please visit.

For further information, please contact Rachel Estrada, Business Law and Policy Program Manager, UCLA School of Law, estrada@law.ucla.edu, (310) 206-1875.