Tax Policy Center

tax expenditures

Campaigns, Proposals, and Reforms: TaxVox
An Experiment: How Low Could Tax Rates Go If Congress Eliminated All Tax Expenditures? How low could Congress cut tax rates without losing revenue? To...
September 13, 2017Howard Gleckman
Campaigns, Proposals, and Reforms: TaxVox
Senator Jeff Flake (R-AZ) is generating some buzz for publishing a 56-page report on what he considers the most egregious preferences in the tax code...
June 13, 2017Howard Gleckman
Individual Taxes: TaxVox
Individual tax expenditures reduced federal revenues by $1.168 trillion in 2015, according to new estimates by the Tax Policy Center. And the biggest share of...
September 28, 2016Yifan PowersDaniel Berger
Individual Taxes: TaxVox
In 2015 , the federal government spent over $980 billion on health care, of which $260 billion – 27% – was through the tax code...
August 22, 2016John IselinPhilip Stallworth
Campaigns, Proposals, and Reforms: TaxVox
Elected officials love to talk about expanding opportunity in America, but few do anything about it. And in a recent report I found that spending for those federal programs that do aim to promote opportunity for all, such as work incentives and support for education, are on a path to shrink as a share of government resources.
April 28, 2016C. Eugene Steuerle
Federal Budget and Economy: TaxVox
In the budget he plans to release tomorrow, President Obama will propose some modest changes to the Affordable Care Act’s much-reviled Cadillac Tax on high-cost employer sponsored health plans. In advance of the proposal, Jason Furman, Chair of the president’s Council of Economic Advisers,
February 7, 2016Leonard E. Burman
Federal Budget and Economy: TaxVox
For years, Congress has struggled with what to do with scores of temporary tax breaks that have come to be known as the “tax extenders .” The usual resolution: Lawmakers fiddle for months. Then, sometime in December, they mindlessly continue the immortal mostly-business tax breaks for another year
November 30, 2015Howard Gleckman
Individual Taxes: TaxVox
The other day, the Census Bureau put out a new report that concluded about one-in-five Americans received government benefits in 2012. But the study, called Dynamics of Economic Well-Being: Participation in Government Programs, 2009–2012: Who Gets Assistance, takes a far too narrow view about who
June 4, 2015Howard Gleckman
Business Taxes: TaxVox
The magic number for today is 16. That is, remarkably, the number of times Congress has extended the allegedly temporary research and experimentation tax credit since it was first enacted in 1981. The question for philosophy class (this is far beyond economics) is this: Can something that has been
May 28, 2015Howard Gleckman
Individual Taxes: TaxVox
Since Tax Day is tomorrow, it seems like a good time to bust a few myths about taxes. Here are five of the biggest misperceptions about the federal revenue code. Most of the info comes from two sources: the Tax Policy Center’s Tax Topics (a trove of great information about who pays what) and the
April 14, 2015Howard Gleckman