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...

read in full

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...

read in full

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...

read in full

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...

read in full

more news

AMT Patch, Extenders, Offsets Mark-Up Set for Nov. 1

Oct 30, 2007 by Dana Chasin

Thursday, Nov. 1, at 11:00 a.m., the House Ways and Means Committee will conduct a mark-up of the Temporary Tax Relief Act of 2007 -- the short-term portion of the broad tax reform bill that Committee chair Rangel unveiled last week. It provides both for a one-year patch for the AMT and for a package extending a number of popular tax credits and deductions for two years.

read in full

Reform Risks Tsk from Those Who Nix Paying for Fix

Oct 29, 2007 by Dana Chasin

The "mother of all tax bills" that House Ways and Means Chair Charles Rangel (D-NY) unveiled last week (see our summary), an effort to fix the Alternative Minimum Tax, provides an easy target for those fixated on how it complies with the House PAYGO rules and see the "mother of all tax hikes." That talk is cheap, but expensive in the long run. PAYGO compliance spares the country increases in the national debt and accompanying debt service costs.

read in full

Senate Suffers Seven-Year Internet Itch

Oct 26, 2007 by Dana Chasin

Last night, the Senate adopted a seven-year extension of the internet access tax moratorium by voice vote. Seven years? Why not 11 or 13, which are also prime numbers. How was this number settled on and how did it win approval from Sens. Tom Carper (D-DE) and Lamar Alexander (R-TN), both of whom sought a four-year limit to the ban? Carper and Alexander offered this, by way of "explanation":

read in full

Friends Don't Let Friends Watch Fox

Oct 26, 2007 by Dana Chasin

(Unless You're Talking about the World Series) And here's why they don't. October 25 edition of Fox News' Your World, host Neil Cavuto (with a hat-tip to Media Matters): Throw in a Fox News alert for you. It is being called the mother of all tax hikes. Democrats unveiling a trillion-dollar tax plan today, it includes a 4 percent surtax on people earning $150,000 a year. Now remember when a million bucks was considered rich only last year at this time? So are these tax hikes going to stop people from striving for success?

read in full

Ways & Means Scoring of Rangel Tax Reform Bill

Oct 25, 2007 by Dana Chasin

The House Ways and Means Committee has released a "very preliminary" scoring of the Tax Reduction and Reform Act of 2007, introduced today by Committee Chair Charles Rangel (D-NY). Here ($).

read in full

Summary of the Rangel Tax Reform Bill

Oct 25, 2007 by Dana Chasin

House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Charles Rangel (D-NY)'s revenue neutral $1 trillion tax reduction and reform bill would repeal the AMT after this year at a cost of $795.66 billion over 10 years. This cost would be recovered by a surtax of between 4 percent and 4.6 percent on adjusted gross incomes (AGI) above $200,000 for married couples filing jointly or above $150,000 for single filers, expected to raise $831.7 billion over 10 years. The bill's individual tax title also

expands the earned income tax credit at a cost of $29.14 billion

read in full

Patch, Extenders Package within the Rangel Bill

Oct 25, 2007 by Dana Chasin

Primed for Mark-Up by Ways and Means, Perhaps Next Week The first order of business, now that House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Charles Rangel (D-NY) has introduced H.R. 3970, the long-awaited Tax Reduction and Reform Act of 2007, are the one-year provisions for an AMT hold-harmless patch for nonrefundable personal credits and an extension of popular tax credits and deductions. Ways and Means will take up these provisions and their offsets as a separate bill for mark-up perhaps as early as next week.

read in full

Higher Taxes

Oct 25, 2007 by Matt Lewis

Robert Reich thinks we should tax income over $500,000 at 50 percent. Who am I to say to no?

read in full

Carried Interest, PAYGO and AMT

Oct 24, 2007 by Matt Lewis

Rather than get into the AMT/PAYGO weeds, I thought I'd point out what's probably obvious: the most likely candidate for an offset to the AMT patch is legislation to close the carried interest loophole. Shutting down a host of other corporate tax loopholes could also do the trick (see this article in The Watcher for more).

read in full