Publications by Topic
Topic: Budget Issues
What's blocking the recovery (Commentary)
Author(s):
Alan Berube , Karen Dynan , Ted Gayer
The Washington Post. The economy's expansion last quarter, for the first time in more than a year, has prompted much speculation that the recession is over. This turning point, however, simply marks an end to the decline in activity.
Published: 11/20/09
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Personal savings need a boost (Commentary)
Author(s):
Leonard E. Burman
The Washington Times. America's days of economic dominance are numbered because we don't save. The government is borrowing like crazy, and households aren't doing much better. The personal savings rate -- the share of after-tax income that people set aside for a rainy day -- has been falling like a stone since the early 1980s.
Published: 11/10/09
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Fix health care. But fix the deficits, too (Commentary)
Author(s):
Alan J. Auerbach , William G. Gale
CNNMoney.com, Op-Ed.
Obama and other policymakers need to pay more attention to a fundamental conflict underlying the health care debate: People want the federal government to do much more than they are willing to pay for through their taxes.
Published: 09/09/09
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Remove the Return (Article/Tax Facts)
Author(s):
William G. Gale
The Volcker task force on tax reform, part of the President's Economic Recovery Advisory Board, faces a daunting task that is made materially more difficult by ex ante constraints placed on its purview and recommendations. Broad-based reform proposals seem to be out of the question, and distributional constraints appear to eliminate many serious ideas. Nevertheless, I believe that significant tax simplification is feasible despite the task force's constraints, and I will take it as a given that simplification
is desirable.
Published: 09/09/09
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Pyrrhic victory on health reform? (Commentary)
Author(s):
Leonard E. Burman
Washington Times op-ed. Leonard Burman discusses the politics of the health care reform debate.
Published: 09/01/09
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Activist Fiscal Policy to Stabilize Economic Activity (Research Report)
Author(s):
Alan J. Auerbach , William G. Gale
Facing the most severe recession since the 1930s, and probably the longest as well, the
U.S. government has adopted an aggressive countercyclical fiscal policy stance, beginning with the “Economic Stimulus Act of 2008” in February of that year, shortly after the recession’s designated starting date, and followed one year later by the much larger “American Recovery and Reinvestment Tax Act of 2009.” These two bills, adopted under different presidents, both contained temporary tax rebates for households and temporary investment incentives for firms, indicating at least limited bipartisan acceptance of these approaches to countercyclical stimulus.
Published: 08/24/09
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The Distribution of Federal Taxes, 2009-12 (Research Report)
Author(s):
Rachel M. Johnson , Jeff Rohaly
Overall, the federal tax system is progressive. On average, households with higher incomes pay taxes that are a larger share of their income. But barring legislative action, the numerous sunsets and phase-ins that Congress has written into the tax code will result in a tax system that is in a state of flux over the next few years. As a result, current law dictates significant changes in the degree of progressivity in the federal tax system between now and 2012. This paper summarizes the Tax Policy Center's latest estimates of the distribution of federal taxes for 2009 through 2012.
Published: 08/21/09
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Mitigating the Potential Inequity of Reducing Corporate Rates (Occasional Paper)
Author(s):
Dan Halperin
Some tax proposals would reduce the marginal corporate tax rate. Others would boost the top individual rate. Although a differential between corporate and individual rates could reduce the overall tax on distributed corporate income, it could also enable higher-income taxpayers to shelter income from taxation. This paper explains how denying the lower corporate rate to income from services and passive investments combined with provisions that prevent people from permanently escaping tax on retained earnings would mitigate this problem.
Published: 07/29/09
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Conversations: Leonard Burman (Interview)
Author(s):
Sam Young
Tax Notes, July 27, 2009. Leonard E. Burman is a fellow at the Urban Institute and director of the Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center. He previously served as deputy assistant secretary for tax analysis at the Treasury Department from 1998 to 2000 and as senior analyst at the Congressional Budget Office. This fall, he will become the first Daniel Patrick Moynihan Chair in Public Policy at the Maxwell School of Syracuse University. Burman recently sat down with Tax Analysts' Sam Young to discuss his future plans, the outlook for healthcare reform in Congress, and his proposal to create a VAT to pay for healthcare.
Published: 07/28/09
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Here Comes the Next Fiscal Crisis (Commentary)
Author(s):
Alan J. Auerbach , William G. Gale
Los Angeles Times op-ed, July 8, 2009. In the immediate future, policymakers will face a delicate balancing act between encouraging economic recovery and establishing fiscal sustainability. Alan J. Auerbach and William G. Gale examine the economic challenges facing the U.S.
Published: 07/10/09
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