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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Administration's Clean-Up Crew

Oct 23, 2007 by Craig Jennings

Via BNA (sorry, no link), we learn that Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, through a letter to House Ways and Means Committee member Rep. Tom Reynolds (R-NY), is imploring Congress to clean up the Bush Administration's mess:

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AMT: Prospects for Reform and the PAYGO Challenge

In the coming weeks, Congress will come to grips with what is arguably the most important tax issue of the year, the Alternative Minimum Tax (AMT). In the very near future, House Ways and Means Committee Chair Charles Rangel (D-NY) will propose a "patch" to avoid a steep increase in the number of taxpayers liable under the AMT, as well as what he calls "the mother of all tax bills" — his long-awaited measure to repeal the AMT.

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Media Continues to Misreport on Carried Interest

Oct 22, 2007 by Dana Chasin

In a Coma, or in Committee?

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Nussle: PAYGO "is a little bit perverse"

Oct 19, 2007 by Dana Chasin

Although the American public is giving Congress some of its lowest ratings ever received, Congress has done an admirable job in respect worth pointing out: adherence to the principles of PAYGO. Between the adoption of the conference agreement on May 16, and the start of fiscal year 2008, nine laws affecting budget authority, outlays, or revenues have been enacted, including:

Food and Drug Administration Amendments
Extending Andean Trade Preferences
Extending Transitional Medical Assistance
Implementing 9/11 Commission Recommendations

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The State of the Estate Tax

Oct 18, 2007 by Dana Chasin

There are a few reasons to think that the idea of estate tax repeal has little of the sway in Congress of even a year ago, when then-Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-TN) put the issue on the floor every chance he could. First, the GOP is now divided in its approach to the deficit, with the President and some others desperate to restore their credentials as fiscally responsible.

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Developments Signal AMT Compromise in the Works

Oct 17, 2007 by Dana Chasin

Two key developments today point to a possible emerging House-Senate compromise on alternative minimum tax (ATM) legislation.

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Invoice for AMT, R&D, WOTC, etc.

Oct 17, 2007 by Dana Chasin

A Menu of Offsets to Consider With must-pass a one-year AMT patch (cost estimate: $55 billion) and a two-year tax extenders bill ($30 billion) coming down the pike in the next month or two in Congress, fiscally responsible members are searching high and low for the roughly $85 billion in offsets needed under PAYGO for these two bills alone.

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There's Deficits, and Then There's Deficits

Oct 17, 2007 by Matt Lewis

From the good folks over at Angry Bear and Econospeak, a little common sense about the deficit: it's not really going down. The general fund deficit, that is. You see, Social Security revenues are in surplus, and a whole lot of money is being taken out of the flush Social Security trust fund to pay for current government services. This surplus has tremendously contributed to the declining unified deficit, the figure that gets most media attention. See this graph for a good representation.

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Carried Interest, PTP Offsets Weighed for AMT Patch

Oct 16, 2007 by Dana Chasin

Per BNA, Senate Finance Committee chair Max Baucus (D-MT) indicated today that the Committee may move to a mark-up of a one-year AMT patch as early as next week. Baucus estimates the cost of the patch at $55 billion but added "It's difficult to come up with offsets that will pass." Committee ranking member Charles Grassley (R-IA) has long said that he prefers forgoing offsets even for an AMT patch, but Baucus says that "my preference is not to waive" PAYGO. Such a waiver would require 60 votes in the Senate.

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Internet Access: a Tax-Free Zone?

Oct 16, 2007 by Dana Chasin

This afternoon, the House passed H.R. 3678, a four-year extension of the moratorium on state and local internet access taxation. The vote was 405-2. Such opposition to the bill as was voiced came from those who sought a permanent moratorium. From our perspective, the debate on this issue has been oddly one-sided.

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