In principle, a well-timed and carefully designed economic stimulus package can help avert or minimize a recession. In practice, timing a fiscal stimulus is nearly impossible since forecasters usually "predict" economic turning points only long after they have occurred. Len Burman and Jeff...

This fact sheet examines the effects of the American Taxpayer Relief Act of 2012 (ATRA) on charitable giving. The major individual income tax provisions are estimated to increase giving by $3.3 billion or 1.5 percent, relative to 2012 law, mainly because of the increase in the top marginal tax...

If we're going to have a club whose members pay fairly low individual tax rates, we need to determine who deserves membership on the basis of principles. Few argue that letting hedge fund managers and private equity partners in the club furthers either progressivity or efficiency principles. The...

In a contribution to The Wall Street Journal's MarketWatch, Eric Toder explains why corporations expatriate from the United States and argues that they will continue to do so until Congress addresses the fundamental flaws in the corporate income tax. He then provides some possible solutions to...

Policy analysts have long debated how best to budget for student loans, mortgage guarantees, and other federal lending programs. Under official budget rules, these programs appear highly profitable; under an alternative, favored by many analysts, they appear to lose money. That discrepancy...

Volunteers are extremely valuable to the charitable sector: Urban Institute researchers estimated the value of their labor at $163 billion in 2013. Though charitable contributions can be deducted from income taxes, volunteers cannot deduct the value of their labor. By economic consensus,...

The federal government and most states have per-unit gas taxes. Because they tax gallons purchased, and not a percentage of purchase price, revenues are falling across the country as Americans buy less gas. If states do not want to cut transportation projects they now have to increase tax rates...

Each filing season, Brookings and a number of other research organizations receive queries from people working in the field, wanting to know more about EITC participation in their communities. Unfortunately, researchers face constraints in their ability to provide accurate estimates on many EITC...

The EITC represents a considerable investment in immigrant neighborhoods, totaling $6.7 billion in tax year 1999. This study finds that these communities access the credit at significant rates, but that their low-income taxpayers appear more likely to use commercial tax preparers. To further...

The Saver's Credit, enacted in 2001, provides a government matching contribution, in the form of a nonrefundable tax credit, for voluntary individual contributions to 401(k)-type plans, IRAs, and similar retirement savings arrangements. This paper provides background on the evolution and design...