Revenue & Spending

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

Deficits, War and Trade-Offs

Oct 10, 2007 by Matt Lewis

It is done: the deficit for FY2007 was $161 billion. Strangely, the President has yet to proclaim "mission accomplished" for "reducing" it from the inflated estimate he gave in his budget- $244 billion. Perhaps he isn't bragging because he didn't reduce it (or perhaps not).

read in full

Congress Avoids Tough Questions of FY 2008 War Funding

President Bush and Congress continue to deny the fiscal realities of prosecuting two simultaneous wars that cost about $12 billion per month. By classifying the president's FY 2008 $193 billion war funding request an "emergency supplemental" and stifling discussion of war financing, Congress sidesteps the critical task of setting and adequately funding national priorities.

read in full

Death of Environmentali$m

Oct 9, 2007 by Matt Lewis

When Ted Northouse and Michael Schellenberger wrote "Death of Environmentalism," it got people throughout the progressive policy community thinking about what might be wrong with their strategy for pushing policy. They've turned that article into a book that just came out. In it they put forward what they believe to be a politically viable way to solve global warming. TPM Cafe is currently debating it.

read in full

CBO: $160 Billion Budget Deficit in FY 2007

Oct 9, 2007 by Craig Jennings

CBO estimates that the federal budget deficit for FY 2007 was $160 billion, or 1.2 percent of the size of the overall economy. This figure represents about an $87 billion decline from the FY 2006 deficit of $248 billion, which was 1.9 percent of the economy. CBO's Monthly Budget Review, October 2007

read in full

House To Vote On IRS Private Tax Collectors

Oct 9, 2007 by Matt Lewis

This Thursday, the House is scheduled to take a floor vote on a bill to repeal the IRS private tax collection program.

read in full

Carry the News -- How Interesting is This?

Oct 9, 2007 by Dana Chasin

The front page of today's WaPo has another Jeff Birnbaum job with "news" that Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) has privately told lobbyists he does not plan to bring a carried interest bill to the Senate floor this calendar year. First of all, this qualifies as news, let alone front-page above-the-fold news? Reid has been saying repeatedly for three months that he did not intend to bring such a bill to the full Senate in 2007.

read in full

SCHIP Pressure Getting To Bush?

Oct 9, 2007 by Matt Lewis

President Bush says he's open to more money for SCHIP than his paltry initial request, according to The Hill.

read in full

The Cure For the Common Robert Samuelson Column

Oct 9, 2007 by Matt Lewis

CBO Director Peter Orszag spoke at a conference on evidence-based medical reform and the long term fiscal challenge yesterday. The entire conference had interesting speakers, particularly Prof. Elliott Fisher. Very interesting stuff.

read in full

In Support of Bush's SCHIP Veto

Oct 5, 2007 by Dana Chasin

President Bush's veto this week of the bill to provide private health care for five million additional children under SCHIP left even stalwart congressional conservatives such as Republican Sens. Orrin Hatch (UT) and Charles Grassley (IA) "sputtering in incomprehension." So riding to the rescue, providing the president with some points supporting the rational behind his veto comes an LA Times op-ed, The Cult of "For the Children", which seems to channel that great American...

read in full

Ryan's World: PAYGO a "Dangerous Fiscal Course"

Oct 5, 2007 by Dana Chasin

NEWS ITEM: 8. Which political party, the (Democrats) or the (Republicans), do you trust to do a better job handling The federal budget deficit? Democrats: 52; Republicans: 29. [This Washington Post-ABC News poll was conducted by telephone September 27-30, 2007, among a random national sample of 1,114 adults.]

read in full