Secret Campaign Giving and Abusing the Tax Law
The two big stories of this campaign season are voter backlash against Democrats and the rise of the so-called Super PACs– massive campaign funding organizations that use the tax law to protect the...
View ArticleSimplifying Child Related Incentives in the Tax Code
With only a weekend left to settle up with Uncle Sam, figuring out how much you owe (or stand to gain) is far from child’s play—particularly if you have kids. Parents must wade through page after page...
View ArticleMany Urban Poor File Their Taxes Early, Use Rapid Refunds
An interesting blog from my Urban Institute colleague Brett Theodos on the use of refund anticipation loans and refund anticipation checks among low-income tax filers: It’s tax day, and gauging by...
View ArticleWhat the Romney and Gingrich 1040s Tell Us About How We Tax The Rich
Ernest Hemingway: I am getting to know the rich. Mary Colum: I think you’ll find the only difference between the rich and other people is that the rich have more money. It turns out that when it comes...
View ArticleTax Extenders and Tax Reform
On Tuesday, I testified before the Senate Finance Committee at a hearing titled “Extenders and Tax Reform: Seeking Long-Term Solutions.” I was already depressed about the state of our tax system before...
View ArticleThe Turbo Tax Paradox
Like many of you, I just finished my 2011 tax return. Counting worksheets, it was 59 pages long. It occurs to me that our current insanely complex tax rules are made possible by technology. Yes,...
View ArticleFive Challenges for the IRS’s New Capital Gains Reporting Rules
Sellers of stocks and other assets have always had to calculate their cost basis (generally, what they paid for the investment) in order to figure their taxable capital gains. In the past, this was...
View ArticleBillions in Tax Refund Fraud–and How to Stop Most of it
The Treasury may be losing as much as $5 billion a year from fraudulent tax refund claims—and most of that fraud is entirely preventable. The New York Times reportedyesterday about the rampant use of...
View ArticleCan Behavioral Science Improve Tax Compliance?
In Sunday’s New York Times, Richard Thaler laments that “as a general rule, the United States government is run by lawyers who occasionally take advice from economists.” That makes for better policy...
View ArticleChairman Camp Agrees: Too Many Choices Burden our Tax System
Last week’s draft plan by House Ways & Means Committee Chair Dave Camp (R-MI) to reform the taxation of financial products includes two key changes that would simplify rules, reduce manipulation,...
View ArticleSleepless Nights for Tax Evaders
Many people who have failed to pay taxes on funds stashed in overseas bank accounts will likely toss and turn during coming nights, worried that the tax man will soon come knocking at the door. Will...
View ArticleThe Homebuyer Tax Credit: When Will They Ever Learn?
The early returns are coming in on the First-Time Homebuyer Tax Credit. And it appears to be a bigger boondoggle than even I thought it would be. At a House Ways & Means Oversight subcommittee...
View ArticleShutting Down Virginia’s iFile
Okay, this one’s personal. For years I’ve filed my state tax return using iFile, Virginia’s free on-line tax filing service. I do that partly because I’m cheap—I don’t want to pay Intuit $15 to send my...
View ArticleEstate Taxes, Capital Gains, and Paperwork
The one-year lapse of the federal estate tax this year came with the unwelcome requirement that heirs assume their benefactors’ bases for some assets they inherit in 2010, as Howard Gleckman explained...
View ArticleHow Not to Fix the IRS
House Republicans have decided to make the IRS their summer piñata. Its leadership says it will bring a series of anti-IRS proposals to the floor later this month. And an appropriations subcommittee’s...
View ArticleDo Low-Income Taxpayers Cheat?
My blog last Tuesday on overblown concerns about people falsely claiming subsides under the Affordable Care Act’s insurance exchanges generated a lot of response. Much focused on my assertion that the...
View ArticleAre Some Americans Paying Federal Income Tax They Don’t Owe?
Headline got your attention? No, it isn’t a come-on for a new tax avoidance scheme. Rather, it reflects an interesting but little known problem with the federal income tax system: People who have tax...
View ArticleAbuse of financial products by hedge funds
Today, I testified before the U.S. Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations (the “Subcommittee”) on the abuse of structured financial products by hedge funds, in particular by the Renaissance...
View ArticleHave We Created a Two-Tiered Tax System—One for the Powerful and One for the...
Unlike the rest of us, many high-income, influential people and organizations have close to a free hand when it comes to their taxes. Already underfunded and understaffed, the IRS seems incapable of...
View ArticleWill Immigrants Get A Tax Windfall From Refundable Credits?
In the end-of-the-year congressional scramble, lawmakers scuttled an effort to permanently extend a number of tax breaks—largely because many feared it would open the door to widespread use of...
View ArticleOne Avenue to Bipartisan Tax Reform: Simplification and Improved Tax...
There are many ways to restructure the tax code. Elected officials often fail to detect opportunity when they adhere in a path-dependent way to one past model of success, such the 1986 tax reform. An...
View ArticleThe IRS Could Improve EITC Compliance by Regulating Tax Preparers
Tax preparers play a critical role helping low income working families collect benefits from the Earned Income Tax Credit. Almost 60 percent of families claiming the EITC in 2010 and 2011 did so with...
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