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Research report
Campaigns, Proposals, and Reforms

Bush Administration Tax Policy: Summary and Outlook

This is the eighth and final installment in a series that evaluates tax policy in the Bush Administration, covering the years 2001 to 2004. The paper summarizes our principal findings, and discusses some of the key tax and fiscal issues facing the Administration in its second term.

November 29, 2004
Peter OrszagWilliam G. Gale
Research report
Federal Budget and Economy

Bush Administration Tax Policy: Starving the Beast

This paper examines links between the Bush Administration's tax cuts and the goal of "starving the beast"--that is, holding down government spending. It is at best unclear whether tax cuts are effective in restraining spending. The data appear more consistent with the view that once fiscal...

November 15, 2004
William G. GalePeter Orszag
Research report
Campaigns, Proposals, and Reforms

Bush Administration Tax Policy: Down Payment on Tax Reform?

Bush Administration tax policy has sometimes been defended as a piecemeal approach to fundamental reform. Consistent with fundamental reform, the tax cuts reduced marginal capital income tax rates and flattened rates. But the similarities end there. A well designed consumption tax would (a) be...

November 8, 2004
William G. GalePeter Orszag
Research report
Federal Budget and Economy

Bush Administration Tax Policy: Short-Term Stimulus

This paper examines the effects of recent tax cuts as a short-term economic stimulus. The passage of the tax cuts was well-timed to offset economic downturns, but several elements of the structure of the tax cuts were poorly designed to provide short-term stimulus. For example, the tax cuts were...

November 1, 2004
William G. GalePeter Orszag
Research report
Federal Budget and Economy

Bush Administration Tax Policy

Tax policy can raise growth in the long run increasing the level and improving the allocation of labor and capital inputs. The net effect of the recent tax cuts on growth is theoretically uncertain and is the net effect of (a) the generally positive effects induced by lower marginal tax rates, (...

October 18, 2004
Peter OrszagWilliam G. Gale
Research report
Federal Budget and Economy

Bush Administration Tax Policy

This paper is the first of a series that summarizes and analyzes these policies and proposals. The series has two broad goals: to describe, interpret, and assess what has happened; and to examine the consequences of making the tax cuts permanent. This paper provides background information...

September 13, 2004
William G. GalePeter Orszag
Research report
Federal Budget and Economy

The Fiscal Gap and Retirement Saving Revisited

Because of the strikingly large long-term fiscal gaps being projected recently for the United States, researchers have searched for hidden assumptions underlying revenue projections that might be biasing the results. This paper addresses the extent to which alternative projections of tax-...

July 26, 2004
Alan J. AuerbachWilliam G. GalePeter Orszag
Brief

Improving the Saver's Credit

The saver's credit, enacted in 2001 as part of the Bush administration's tax cut legislation, provides a government matching contribution for voluntary individual contributions to 401(k) plans, individual retirement accounts (IRAs), and similar retirement savings arrangements. It is the first...

July 1, 2004
William G. GalePeter OrszagJ. Mark Iwry
Research report
Federal Budget and Economy

Sources of the Long-Term Fiscal Gap

Over a permanent horizon, the fiscal gap now exceeds 7 percent of GDP under the CBO baseline and 10 percent of GDP under an adjusted baseline, substantially higher than a year ago. Allocating the fiscal gap to different programs is not straightforward, though. Most government programs are...

May 24, 2004
Alan J. AuerbachWilliam G. GalePeter Orszag