About the TCJA rollbacks and an infrastructure plan… Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said Tuesday that any proposals to pay for infrastructure improvements will not include rollbacks to provisions of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act. “That’s a non-starter…. the last thing we wanna do is step on all of this [economic] growth.” Then again, TPC’s Howard Gleckman suggests that it’s probably best not to take a $2 trillion infrastructure plan too seriously, though Senate Minority Leader Schumer and Speaker Pelosi might want us to: "I suspect that nobody in yesterday’s White House meeting expected the result would be a real bill that President Trump would sign this year or next…. The trick for the rest of us is to get the joke.”
What about a gas tax hike? Republican Rep. Chris Collins of New York has an idea to help fund infrastructure projects. He wants Congress to double the 18.4-cents-per-gallon gasoline tax. He’d also increase the current fee that airline passengers pay per flight from $4.50 to $8 or $9. Problem is, most of his GOP colleagues don’t support the ideas.
New York edges closer to a law allowing release of President Trump’s state tax returns. A bill authorizing the release of his returns passed in the State Senate’s Budget and Revenue Committee. The full state senate will take up the measure next week. If it passes, the state tax commissioner will be able to turn over Trump’s New York tax returns in response to requests from either the US House Ways & Means Committee, the Senate Finance Committee, or the Joint Committee on Taxation.
What would Hamilton and Burr do if faced with a pension and benefit shortfall? The Tax Hound considers the difficulties her township and other local governments face when trying to meet public pension and retirement benefit obligations. Hard choices, like the tradeoff between service cuts and tax increases, make for heated conversations. It’s a good thing dueling is illegal.
Is tax efficiency the same as as a tax loophole? Bloomberg explains how Vanguard removes taxable capital gains by making rapid, or “heartbeat” trades, in the exchange-traded portion of a mutual fund. Those trades move appreciated stocks out of the mutual fund without incurring taxes. Of course, a mutual fund shareholder will eventually pay taxes on any gains when exiting the fund.
You could get your tax refund in bitcoin, if you want. US citizens can now accept their federal or state tax refunds in the cryptocurrency, thanks to a new joint endeavor between BitPay and tax services company Refundo. This follows Ohio, which opened up a bitcoin payment option to businesses operating there in 2018, and Seminole County Florida, which as of this spring offers the option for payments like property taxes .
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