Paul L. Caron
Dean
Pepperdine Caruso
School of Law
Think Tank Reports
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CBPP: Where Do Federal Tax Revenues Come From?
Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, Where Do Federal Tax Revenues Come From?: In fiscal year 2011, the federal government spent $3.6 trillion on the services it provides, such as national defense, health care programs like Medicare and Medicaid, Social Security benefits for the elderly and disabled, and investments in infrastructure and education, in addition…
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Tax Policy Center Takes on WSJ, Doubles Down on Criticism of Romney Tax Plan
Tax Policy Center, Implications of Governor Romney's Tax Proposals: FAQs and Responses: A recent TPC paper examined tradeoffs among revenues, progressivity and tax rates in tax reform. It concluded that, under certain assumptions, any revenue-neutral plan along the lines Governor Romney has outlined would reduce taxes for high-income households, thus requiring higher taxes on other,…
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Tax Foundation: A Global Perspective on Territorial Taxation
Tax Foundation: A Global Perspective on Territorial Taxation: Catherine the Great is supposed to have said, “A great wind is blowing, and that gives you either imagination or a headache.” In Washington, winds are stirring for corporate tax reform. But while there is broad bipartisan agreement that tax rates should be reduced, there is less…
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The Romney Tax Plan, the Tax Policy Center, and the Wall Street Journal
Following up on yesterday's post, WSJ: The Romney Hood Tax Fairy Tale: Tax Policy Center: Understanding TPC’s Analysis of Governor Romney’s Tax Plan, by David Marron: The Tax Policy Center’s latest research report went viral last week, drawing attention in the presidential campaign and sparking a constructive discussion of the practical challenges of tax reform.…
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The Ten Most Profitable U.S. Companies Paid a 9% Federal Tax Rate
Linda Beale (Wayne State), Corporations Don't Need More Tax Breaks: If you listen to the corporate lobbyists, and the right-wingers who plead their cases for them in Congress and in the media, you'd think that corporations are so heavily taxed that it is threatening their ability to continue to conduct business and be competitive in…
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Jumping Off the Tax Cliff
Tax Policy Center: The Fiscal Cliff? Let's Pass Right Over It, by William Gale (Brookings): The expiration of the Bush tax cuts and the automatic spending cuts slated to take effect in a few months offer a rare chance to do what policymakers have not, so far, been able to do – deal seriously with…
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TPC: Romney Plan Would Cut Taxes for Rich, Raise Taxes on Middle Class and Poor
Tax Policy Center: On the Distributional Effects of Base-Broadening Income Tax Reform, by Samuel Brown, William Gale & Adam Looney: This paper examines the tradeoffs among three competing goals that are inherent in a revenue-neutral income tax reform—maintaining tax revenues, ensuring a progressive tax system, and lowering marginal tax rates—drawing on the example of the…
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CBPP: Bush Tax Cuts Have Made Tax Code Less Progressive, Delivered Windfall to Rich
Center on Budget and Policy Priorities: Bush Tax Cuts Have Provided Extremely Large Benefits to Wealthiest Americans Over Last Nine Years: The tax cuts first enacted under President Bush in 2001 and 2003 have made the tax code less progressive and delivered a large windfall to the highest-income taxpayers. Tax Policy Center estimates for the…
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Tax Foundation: CBO Data Shows Increasing Redistribution in Tax Code
Tax Foundation: CBO Report Shows Increasing Redistribution in the Tax Code Despite No Long-term Trend in Income Inequality: Earlier this month, President Obama renewed his pledge to raise taxes on high-income earners, premised upon the belief that they do not pay their “fair share.” However, the latest data reveals that their share, whether fair or…
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Tax Foundation: Tax Equity and the Growth in Nonpayers
Tax Foundation: Tax Equity and the Growth in Nonpayers: In 2010, 41% of all tax returns filed had no income tax liability. This represents over 58 million income tax filers. Nonpayers have grown substantially over the last two decades. In 1990, only about 21 percent of returns had no tax liability, about half of what…
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Bartlett: Will Defense Cuts Kill the Anti-Tax Pledge?
The Fiscal Times: Will Defense Cuts Kill the Anti-Tax Pledge?, by Bruce Bartlett: Republicans are between the rock of defense cuts that they view as unpalatable and the tax pledge hard place. There is no doubt that Democrats would agree to a tax increase to offset the defense sequester, but would oppose any other alternative…
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CBPP: Allowing High-Income Bush Tax Cuts to Expire Would Affect Few Small Businesses
Center on Budget and Policy Priorities: Allowing High-Income Bush Tax Cuts to Expire Would Affect Few Small Businesses: Allowing the top two marginal tax rates to return to pre-2001 levels as scheduled next year would affect very few small businesses, a recent Treasury Department study found. The study shows that only 2.5% of small business…
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CBPP: A Federal Renters’ Tax Credit
Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, Renters’ Tax Credit Would Promote Equity and Advance Balanced Housing Policy: Over the past several decades, the nation’s housing policy has focused predominantly on increasing homeownership. Most federal housing expenditures now benefit families with relatively little need for assistance. About 75 percent of federal housing expenditures support homeownership, when…
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TPC: How Hard Is It to Cut Tax Preferences to Pay for Lower Tax Rates?
Tax Policy Center, How Hard Is It to Cut Tax Preferences to Pay for Lower Tax Rates?: Some political leaders have proposed to lower individual income tax rates and make up the lost revenue by eliminating tax preferences. To help inform the discussion of such proposals, we examine illustrative revenue-neutral combinations of lower rates and…
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CBPP: 10 Things You Need to Know About the Capital Gains Tax
Center on Budget and Policy Priorities: 10 Things You Need to Know About the Capital Gains Tax: 1. Capital gains tax rates are the lowest since the Great Depression. 2. There’s no evidence that a low capital gains tax rate boosts the stock market, investment, or the economy. 3. A large share of capital gains…
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A New Measure of Consumption Inequality
American Enterprise Institute: A New Measure of Consumption Inequality, by Kevin Hassett & Aparna Mathur: In recent times, the debate surrounding middle-class welfare has tended to focus on the issue of income inequality. In a popular 2006 paper [The Evolution of Top Incomes: A Historical and International Perspective (updated here)], economists Thomas Piketty and Emmanuel…
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More Troubling Tax Increases in the Obama Budget Fine Print
The Heritage Foundation: The President’s 2013 Budget: More Troubling Tax Increases in the Fine Print, by Curtis S. Dubay: Buried in the fine print of President Obama’s FY 2013 budget proposal is an expansion of his cap on itemized tax deductions—to now include exemptions and exclusions. Applying the cap to exemptions and exclusions is yet…
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State Income Tax Collections Per Capita
The Top 14 states all voted for President Obama in 2008: New York: $1,796 Connecticcut: $1,616 Massachusetts: $1,549 Oregon: $1,293 California: $1,229 Minnesota: $1,219 New Jersey: $1.176 Hawaii: $1,127 Virginia: $1,086 Maryland: $1,077 Wisconsin: $1,020 Maine: $981 North Carolina: $961 Delaware: $952
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CBPP: Beware the ‘Tax Reform’ Scam
Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, Tax Reform Holds Promise, But if Not Done Carefully, Could Increase the Deficit and Inequality and Harm the Economy, by Chuck Marr & Chye-Ching Huang: An approach to tax reform that some policymakers are heavily promoting — committing to costly and regressive tax rate cuts upfront, with a promise…
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TPC Hosts Making Wall Street Pay: The Pros and Cons of Financial Taxes
The Tax Policy Center hosts a program today on Making Wall Street Pay: The Pros and Cons of Financial Taxes (webcast here): The global financial crisis drained government coffers and rocked public confidence around the world. Many leaders now believe taxes on financial transactions and/or financial activities could relieve these shortfalls and shore up the…
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CTJ: Ending Apple’s Offshore Tax Shenanigans
Following up on last Sunday's New York Times front page story, How Apple Sidesteps Billions in Global Taxes: New York Times: Letter to the Editor, by Robert S. McIntyre (Director, Citizens for Tax Justice): In its latest annual report, Apple said that as of last September it had a staggering $54 billion parked offshore (since…
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Americans Pay More in Taxes than for Food, Clothing, and Shelter Combined
Tax Foundation, Americans Paying More in Taxes than for Food, Clothing, and Shelter: In 2012, Americans will pay approximately $4.041 trillion in taxes, which is $152 billion, or 3.9%, more than they will spend on housing, food, and clothing. … Between 1929 and the early 1980s, aggregate tax collections were less than total expenditures on…
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ACA: Recommendations for U.S. International Tax Law Reform
Jackie Bugnion (American Citizens Abroad), Recommendation for U.S. International Tax Law Reform, 66 Tax Notes Int'l 459 (Apr. 30, 2012): For reasons detailed below, ACA proposes two complementary changes to U.S. tax laws as they apply to American citizens and green card holders resident abroad: Eliminate citizenship-based taxation. Collect withholding taxes at source on all…
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TPC Hosts What We Talk About When We Talk About Fairness
The Tax Policy Center hosts a lunchtime program today (noon – 1:30 p.m. EST) on What We Talk About When We Talk About Fairness (webcast here): This forum will tackle the many dimensions of fairness through multiple lenses: economics, history, and philosophy, especially as they come into play in debates over taxes, spending, and public…