Federal Tax Policy

Feb 8, 2016

Top 400 Taxpayers See Tax Rates Rise, But There’s More to the Story

As Americans were gathering party supplies to greet the New Year, the Internal Revenue Service released their annual report of cumulative tax data reported on the 400 tax r...

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Feb 4, 2016

Chlorine Bleach Plants Needlessly Endanger 63 Million Americans

Chlorine bleach plants across the U.S. put millions of Americans in danger of a chlorine gas release, a substance so toxic it has been used as a chemical weapon. Greenpeace’s new repo...

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Jan 25, 2016

U.S. Industrial Facilities Reported Fewer Toxic Releases in 2014

The Toxics Release Inventory (TRI) data for 2014 is now available. The good news: total toxic releases by reporting facilities decreased by nearly six percent from 2013 levels. Howe...

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Jan 22, 2016

Methane Causes Climate Change. Here's How the President Plans to Cut Emissions by 40-45 Percent.

UPDATE (Jan. 22, 2016): Today, the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) released its proposed rule to reduce methane emissions...

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Update on Congressional Activities

Sep 24, 2008 by Adam Hughes*

Quick update following up on my earlier post about Congress' progress during this final potentially final week of the session. The House has passed the CR/Omnibus/Emergency gigantic package of spending items this afternoon, 370-58. The House is currently working on voting on some of the tax bills I jumped into earlier, most of which will have to be sent back to the Senate either because of changes in offsets or due to minor differences. More to come tomorrow.

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Congress is a Blur of Activity

Sep 24, 2008 by Adam Hughes*

As the clock winds down on the 110th Congress, legislators are working at a furious pace this week, vetting financial bailout proposals, passing tax and spending legislation, holding oversight hearings, etc. All the things that Congress is supposed to do on a regular basis. It's just quite shocking to see them actually doing it. So, here's a quick rundown on where things stand. Senate

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Shockingly, Republicans Want to Bailout Wall Street with Tax Cuts

Sep 23, 2008 by Craig Jennings

Budget afficionado Stan Collender says that a $700 billion Wall Street bailout will define the budget and, ultimately, the next president's spending priorities for several years.

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Picking Up the Tab

Sep 23, 2008 by Craig Jennings

With all the news of the massive Wall Street bailout, I've heard really nothing about how this $700 billion gamble is supposed to be paid for (other than more borrowing, which is to say paid for by later). And what I have read, makes me real nervous. In a "dear colleague" letter, former chair of the Republican Study Committe Rep.

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Free Market Ends as Washington and Wall Street Merge

Following a string of guarantees, buy-outs, and bailouts for various financial firms, Congress is now rushing to authorize the Treasury Secretary to spend $700 billion to bail out the rest of Wall Street. Since its role in the sale of investment bank Bear Stearns to rival J.P. Morgan in March, the federal government has intervened three times in the nation's financial markets by using taxpayer dollars to prop up the value of various private banking and mortgage entities. While taxpayers ought to be concerned about the sums of money involved in these transactions, a more fundamental problem exists: the bottom-line cost is anybody's guess.

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Key Tax Policy Items Remain Unresolved

Congress is scheduled to adjourn for the election season on Sept. 26, but a set of what many consider must-pass tax cut bills have yet to be sent to the president's desk. As differences between the House and Senate remain over offsets, and as a massive Wall Street bailout bill has grabbed the spotlight, final congressional approval of these measures before adjournment remains less than certain.

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Details of Possible CR Emerge

Sep 22, 2008 by Adam Hughes*

House Democratic leaders have announced some details of a potential continuing resolution (CR) that would keep the federal government operating for half a year from the start of the FY 2009 fiscal year on October 1 through March of 2009. With none of the appropriations bills enacted into law and only eight days before the start of the fiscal year, passage of a CR is almost guaranteed. CongressDaily reported this afternoon some of the details of the plan:

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CBPP: Updated Child Tax Credit Expansion Analysis

Sep 22, 2008 by Craig Jennings

The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities has updated their analysis of the proposed expansion of the Child Tax Credit (CTC) that is currently being debated in Congress. The CTC expansion is included as part of the "tax extenders" package of tax cuts that is scheduled to be debated this week. Looks like the expansion would help some pretty hard working folks:

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What About the Rest of Us?

Sep 19, 2008 by Craig Jennings

As Wall Street collapses under the weight of its greed, bad luck, and basic stupidity, the Free MarketTM crusaders of the Bush White House have come out of the pro-regulation, big-government closet. This morning, Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson said that the federal government will ride to the rescue of the investors in distress.

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Feds Seeking Back Taxes from Feds

Sep 19, 2008 by Adam Hughes*

Federal News Radio posted a short report from earlier this week about efforts at the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) to collect over $3.5 billion in back taxes from federal employees. The Internal Revenue Service is trying to collect billions of dollars in unpaid taxes from nearly half a million federal employees. According to IRS records, 171,549 current federal workers did not voluntarily pay their federal income taxes in 2007. The same is true for 37,752 active duty military and nearly 200,000 retired civilian and military personnel.

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