Expert

William G. Gale

Codirector

Primary tasks

Brief

Making the Tax System Work for Low-Income Savers

The federal tax system provides little incentive for participation in tax-preferred saving plans to households that most need to save more for retirement and whose contributions would most likely represent an actual increase in savings. By contrast, the tax code provides its strongest incentives...

July 7, 2005

William G. Gale, J. Mark Iwry, Peter Orszag

Research report

Campaigns, Proposals, and Reforms

The National Retail Sales Tax: What Would the Rate Have To Be?

H.R. 25 would replace federal taxes with a 23 percent tax-inclusive (30
percent tax-exclusive) sales tax on private consumption, household
interest payments, and government spending, and give households payments to offset taxes on consumption up to the poverty line. This paper shows...

May 16, 2005

William G. Gale

Research report

Individual Taxes

Options for Reforming the Estate Tax

Retargeting the estate tax to very wealthy households and lowering its rates would blunt much of the criticism against it while retaining many of its advantages. This brief explains how the estate tax works and examines who is affected by it under current law. It discusses how reform would...

April 18, 2005

William G. Gale, Leonard E. Burman

Research report

Campaigns, Proposals, and Reforms

Demythologizing the Russian Flat Tax

On January 1, 2001, Russia introduced what has frequently been called a "flat tax." In this report, we examine the limited research and information available on the effects of Russias personal income tax reform and reach five principal conclusions: The change in the personal income tax was not a...

March 28, 2005

Clifford G. Gaddy, William G. Gale

Research report

Individual Taxes

The Automatic 401(k): A Simple Way To Strengthen Retirement Saving

The "automatic 401(k)" is a simple concept with enormous potential. An automatic 401(k) plan would have intelligent defaults at each phase of the 401(k) savings cycle: participation, contribution levels, investment allocations, rollovers, and withdrawal options. Workers would be free to opt out...

March 7, 2005

William G. Gale, J. Mark Iwry, Peter Orszag

Brief

The Saver's Credit: Expanding Retirement Savings for Middle- and Lower-Income America

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...

March 1, 2005

William G. Gale, J. Mark Iwry, Peter Orszag

Research report

Federal Budget and Economy

The Outlook for Fiscal Policy

The new budget projections released by the Congressional Budget Office (2005) provide an opportunity to assess fiscal policy in the first four years of the Bush administration and to discuss prospects for the next four years and beyond. This report examines the baseline CBO projections, adjusts...

February 14, 2005

William G. Gale, Peter Orszag

Research report

Federal Budget and Economy

Effects of Recent Tax Cuts on Marginal Tax Rates

The tax fact shows how the 2001 and 2003 tax acts changed marginal tax rates for taxpayers in different income groups.

February 14, 2005

William G. Gale

Research report

Individual Taxes

Should the Budget Exclude the Cost of Individual Accounts?

Proposals to replace part of Social Security with individual accounts are now a focus of attention, with the President expressing a strong desire to push forward on creating individual accounts within Social Security. This paper considers the appropriate budgetary treatment of proposals to...

January 24, 2005

William G. Gale, Jason Furman, Peter Orszag

From TaxVox

CBO Estimates Imply That TCJA Will Boost Incomes For Foreign Investors But Not For Americans
May 10, 2018 –
Proponents of the Tax Cut and Jobs Act (TCJA) claimed it would boost the US economy and generate higher incomes for the American people. At...
Federal Budget and Economy
CBO’s Grim Budget Forecast Underestimates The Nation’s True Fiscal Problems
April 23, 2018 –
CBO recently released new budget projections that incorporate the 2017 tax act and the 2018 spending deals. In a new paper with Alan J. Auerbach,...
The Fiscal Picture Is Worse Than It Looks – And It Looks Bad
April 10, 2018 –
On the surface, CBO’s new projections of the federal debt and deficits over the next 10 years paint a troubling picture. But, dig deeper and...
Who Will Pay for the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act?
January 2, 2018 –
The Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA) will cut taxes by almost $1.5 trillion over the next decade, largely benefiting corporations, pass-through businesses such as...
Congress missed an opportunity to reform the corporate tax
December 26, 2017 –
The centerpiece of the new tax law is a cut in the corporate tax rate from 35 percent to 21 percent. Proponents promise the lower rate will bring jobs and investment to the United States and boost economic growth significantly.
Campaigns, Proposals, and Reforms
Who Would Pay For The Tax Cuts and Jobs Act?
December 8, 2017 –
The House and Senate have passed different versions of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA). Both bills would reduce federal revenues by more than...
What Congressional Tax Cutters Can Learn From Kansas
November 29, 2017 –
As the House and Senate rush to complete a tax bill that will do little to improve the economy, it is worth looking at another...
Campaigns, Proposals, and Reforms
Taxes and Growth – A Cautionary Graph
November 28, 2017 –
The Trump Administration claims that the tax cut going through the House and Senate will significantly boost the overall growth rate of the U.S. economy...
The Right Way, And The Wrong Way, To Measure the Benefits Of Tax Changes
November 20, 2017 –
At the core of the political debate over the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act is an intense and sometimes emotional argument over who benefits. Not...
A Bubble with a Bite: The House Tax Bill Implies a 49.4 Percent Top Effective Tax Rate
November 14, 2017 –
Later this week, the House will vote on its version of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA). The bill advertises a top individual income...
Campaigns, Proposals, and Reforms
Cutting Taxes the Hard Way
November 9, 2017 –
The House Ways & Means Committee’s proposed tax bill is routinely described as a $1.5 trillion tax cut. But to understand why the GOP is...
Gutting the Mortgage Interest Deduction
November 6, 2017 –
The new bill introduced by the House Ways and Means Committee would significantly downsize the mortgage interest deduction. Although this is sure to cause controversy,...
Nine Things to Know about the House GOP Tax Plan
November 3, 2017 –
The House Ways and Means committee released its long-anticipated tax proposal yesterday, the Tax Cut and Jobs Act (TCJA). The plan offers a sweeping set...
The Budget Gimmick that Undermines Public and Private Finances
October 30, 2017 –
The GOP tax reform proposal may limit contributions to traditional 401k plans, while continuing to allow contributions to Roth accounts. It is borrowing in disguise--intended to skirt the borrowing limits in the congressional budget resolution--and may also undermine workers' retirement security.
Tax Cuts Won’t Make America Great Again
October 20, 2017 –
In a speech earlier this week, Donald Trump invoked Ronald Reagan’s 1981 tax cuts as a model for his own plan. Trump said Reagan’s tax...
Campaigns, Proposals, and Reforms
Paying for Tax Cuts
August 15, 2017 –
Policy makers often act like tax cuts are free lunches that can make everyone better off. But over the long run, tax cuts must be...
The Nation’s Fiscal Outlook Has Not Improved
August 4, 2017 –
While policy makers and news headlines focus on debates about health care and tax policy, the U.S. fiscal outlook remains troubling and is a constraint...
State and Local Issues
What the Kansas Tax Cut About-Face Means
June 14, 2017 –
The tax cut that Kansas Governor Sam Brownback hailed in 2012 as “a shot of adrenaline into the heart of the Kansas economy” has been...
Individual Taxes
The Republicans Will Struggle to 'Win' on Tax Reform
March 29, 2017 –
The Republicans’ failure to repeal Obamacare puts pressure on them to win the next big policy battle, on taxes. But the inherent political and economic...
Campaigns, Proposals, and Reforms
A quick guide to the ‘border adjustments’ tax
March 3, 2017 –
The House Republican tax plan proposes to transform the corporate income tax into a destination-based cash flow tax (DBCFT), which would include border adjustments that...
Business Taxes
Understanding the Republicans’ corporate tax reform proposals
January 10, 2017 –
Republicans in the House are proposing sweeping corporate tax reform . Their proposals would effectively repeal the corporate income tax, currently levied at a 35 percent rate, and replace it with a new “destination-based cash-flow tax (DBCFT)” at a 20 percent rate for corporations and 25 percent for unincorporated businesses. The new tax would be border-adjustable – taxing imports and exempting exports.
Federal Budget and Economy
Making America's debt great again
August 10, 2016 –
Donald Trump has put forth some really novel (and poor) ideas – his immigration and trade policies come to mind. His tax reform ideas are...
Business Taxes
No, Value-Added Taxes are Not Bad for Small Business
April 27, 2016 –
Value-added taxes (VATs) have been attracting growing attention in the United States. GOP presidential hopeful Ted Cruz has proposed a VAT as part of...
Campaigns, Proposals, and Reforms
Taxes on the Rich May Change a Lot in 2017
March 16, 2016 –
It’s good to be rich. Depending on who becomes the next president, it could get a lot better or a lot worse. Thanks to our colleagues at the Tax...
Individual Taxes
Two Important New Retirement Savings Initiatives from the Obama Administration
November 19, 2015 –
In recent weeks, the Obama Administration has taken the two most important steps in nearly a decade to increase access to retirement savings for more...

Experts

William G. Gale

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From TaxVox