Update 610 — CBO: A Mean ReversionRapid Return to Pre-COVID Fiscal Status Yesterday’s CBO report projects this year’s deficit will fall by $1.7 trillion — the single largest nominal one-year reduction in the federal deficit in American history. The deficit this year will be lower than CBO projected it would be before the passage of the American …
Update 603 — Tax as a Class Act:Code’s Impact on Income Inequality This past Monday marked the end of tax filing season for 2022. Average Americans again find themselves paying a higher rate than wealthier filers. OMB estimates that the 400 wealthiest Americans pay an average tax rate of only 8.2 percent, widening inequality. Paying a higher tax …
Update 566 – Building a BBB Budget:Can It Be Balanced by Billionaires? Last weekend, Senator Kyrsten Sinema nixed BBB proposals to raise corporate, individual and capital gains tax rates to pay for the bulk of the bill. Scrambling to fill the close to $1 fiscal hole, Democrats have seized upon the billionaire tax option. The plan proposed …
Update 559 — The Payfor Package:Necessity is the Mother of Taxation A reflexive assumption of national opposition to taxes, and support for tax cuts, seemed to have had an axiomatic grip on fiscal politics from the nation’s birth. But the conventional wisdom was seriously challenged by Trump’s $1.9 trillion tax cut of 2017 and left the …
Update 554 — The Road to Reconciliation:Path, Process Ahead for Budget Resolution Last week, the House passed an FY2022 budget resolution, allowing the $3.5 trillion package to move forward via reconciliation, which requires only a simple majority to pass. In order to achieve the Democratic unity needed for passage, Speaker Pelosi promised a group of moderate Democrats …
Update 524 — Tax Plans: Equity AnalysisTax Code as Cause and Cure of Inequities President Biden shook markets yesterday with details of his tax plan he rolled out previously and precisely during the 2020 campaign. Democrats in Congress have a slew of tax proposals on the table as well, many of which are currently under …
Update 523 — Taxes on the Table:Whether, How to Pay for New Plans This week, we will look at tax policy and proposals under discussion from the administration and in Congress. Today, we look at the fiscal side of the equation, how to finance spending going forward. On Friday, we will examine tax equity: what …
Update 479: Fixing a Trumped-Up Code:Biden’s Fiscally Fair, Re-Balanced Budget Vice President Pence and Senator Kamala Harris face off tonight in the one and only Vice Presidential Debate of the cycle. We cover that critical encounter on Friday. Today, as prospects for a next coronavirus package waffle via twitter, we examine the tax plans (or …
Update 455 — Welcome to Tax Day 2020:The Cost of Fighting COVID via the Code The Trump administration’s reflexive economic policy response to COVID — and just about everything else — has been tax cuts, breaks, deferrals, deductions, and delays. The COVID tax relief measures have gone under the radar but represent a kind of …
The world will little note nor long remember the year-end fiscal package that Congress is poised to pass tonight. But it will get almost twice as many votes as impeachment and may be a more unambiguous win for Speaker Pelosi and congressional Democrats. Once this $1.4 trillion tax and spending package is passed and signed, …
