To pay for health care, candidate Harris says she won’t raise taxes on families earning less than $100,000. Presidential hopeful and California Senator Kamala Harris would expand Medicare and allow private insurance companies to offer Medicare plans. She would exempt households making below $100,000 from an income-based premium and would set a higher income threshold for middle-class families living in high-cost areas. She would also levy financial transaction taxes of 0.2 percent for stock trades, 0.1 percent for bond trades and 0.002 percent for derivative transactions. She's also proposing to tax corporations' overseas earnings at the same rate as their domestic earnings.
Rethinking the Presidential Election Campaign Fund. TPC’s Aravind Boddupalli and Erin Huffer consider that little box taxpayers can check on their tax returns each spring. Doing so puts $3 in the Presidential Election Campaign Fund. The box is “the only element of the US system of taxation and budgeting that gives the public direct control over how their tax dollars are spent.” But the share of taxpayers checking the box has fallen, and now a portion of the funds goes to pediatric medical research.
On Thursday: IRS webinar for employers and tax professionals. The agency will conduct a 60-minute online seminar for tax professionals, employers, and anybody else interested in learning about common mistakes when withholding taxes. Also on the agenda—how employers can monitor and limit their risks and options for delinquent business to repay their taxes. The webinar takes place at 2:00 pm eastern time on Thursday, August 1; register here.
Elementary, my dear Watson. California expanded its Film & Television Tax Credit program, and one beneficiary is the maker of Sherlock Holmes 3. The third in the blockbuster franchise will receive a $20.8 million tax break. The California Film Commission approved nine other films to receive the credit. Together the films’ qualified expenditures—including wages paid to the production team and payments to in-state vendors—are expected to exceed $320 million. But are film tax credits the best way to spend tax dollars?
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