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...

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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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Overseas Contractor Insurance Companies Bilking Taxpayers

May 16, 2008 by Craig Jennings

Citing inflated profit margins, a recent report by the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee criticized providers of federally mandated insurance to the Pentagon of sticking taxpayers with exorbitant bills. The Defense Base Act (DBA) requires that all contractors working for the federal government overseas purchase workers compensation insurance for its employees. The cost of the insurance is then passed on to the government. But unlike other federal agencies, the Pentagon has the authority to negotiate its own contracts.

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Unions Boost Wages of Lowest-Income Workers the Most

May 16, 2008 by Adam Hughes*

Shawn Fremstad posted yesterday on a new paper released this month by John Schmitt over at the Center for Economic and Policy Research. The paper studies the impact unions have on income and has some interesting findings:

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GI Bill Surtax Would Affect 0.3% of All Taxpayers

May 16, 2008 by Craig Jennings

When the House approved the domestic spending amendment to the war supplemental spending bill, it approved not only a $52 billion expansion of the GI Bill, but a 0.5% surtax on income for millionaire couples (individuals earning more than $500,000). According a recent Citizens for Tax Justice report, the tax would affect about 0.3% of all taxpayers.

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TPC Testimony Before Senate Finance Committee

May 16, 2008 by Adam Hughes*

The Tax Policy Center, a joint venture of the Urban Institute and Brookings Institution, has published two tesitmonies from a recent Senate Finance Committee hearing on overhaul of the U.S. tax code: A Blueprint for Tax Reform and Health Reform Leonard Burman

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DAILY FISCAL POLICY REPORT -- May 16, 2008

May 16, 2008 by Craig Jennings

Tax Policy -- W&M Approves Extenders; Rejects AMT Patch: By a mostly party-line vote of 25-12, the House Ways and Means Committee approved at $57 billion tax package of an assortment of tax breaks yesterday. The committee also voted down a Republican-offered unpaid-for one-year AMT patch. The bill is expected to be on the House floor next week.

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War Supplemental Update: War Funding Bill Lacks War Funding Provision

May 15, 2008 by Craig Jennings

For reasons not entirely clear -- other than simply throwing a temper tantrum -- House Republicans voted present on the amendment that would add $162.5 billion in war funding to HR 2642, the shell bill that was to be ultimately be the war supplemental spending bill. The vote to add war funding failed 141-149, as anti-war Democrats voted "no" and 132 Republicans voted "present." A second amendment, a provision that would set a Dec. 31, 2009 withdrawal date for troops in Iraq, passed 227-196.

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Best Spin Ever: Doan Fought for Accountability!

May 15, 2008 by Adam Hughes*

When I posted at the end of April that the book had closed on Lurita Doan, former head of the General Services Administration, (GSA) apparently I was wrong. She has resurfaced in interviews in GovExec magazine, on Federal News Radio and most recently in this border-line ludicrous column in Federal Computer Week by Neal Fox, the former assistant commissioner of acquisition at the GSA.

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An Equal Opportunity Crisis

May 15, 2008 by Dana Chasin

House Financial Services Committee chair Rep. Barney Frank -- profiled in the New York Times this week -- is the only person in Washington remotely both as bright and as indecipherable as Alan Greenspan. His accent is the aural equivalent of illegible handwriting. A stenographer should follow him around so you don't have to wait 'til the next day for the transcript.

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GovExec Maps Out the Six Degrees of OSG Bloch

May 15, 2008 by Craig Jennings

GovExec has a neat app that lays out OSG Scott Bloch's recent legal troubles called Six Degrees of Scott Bloch: A Scandal Scorecard

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DAILY FISCAL POLICY REPORT -- May 15, 2008

May 15, 2008 by Dana Chasin

War Supplemental -- House and Senate Action Today: The House is scheduled to vote on a $183.7 billion war supplemental spending package today. The Senate Appropriations Committee will begin work on marking up companion legislation also today. but it's unlikely a bill will reach President Bush by the Memorial Day break. House Amendments to Bill.

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