My latest column for the Christian Science Monitor: Tax reform has emerged as a key issue for GOP presidential hopefuls. Texas Gov. Rick Perry wants to scrap our current system and replace it with a 20 percent flat tax on individual and corporate incomes. Former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich wants to do the [...]

I’ve been reviewing the tax plans of the major Republican presidential hopefuls and am struck at how conventional Mitt Romney’s is.  While Herman Cain wants to replace the entire federal tax code with his 9-9-9 consumption tax and Rick Perry favors a massive tax cut, Romney would do little more than tinker around the edges of the current [...]

Texas Gov. Rick Perry says he wants to cut taxes for everyone and balance the budget. It’s probably impossible to do both. Sadly, Perry’s new fiscal plan may fail at each.  But just how far short he falls depends on what you’re measuring his plan against. I was a pretty decent basketball player before my knees [...]

One of the biggest problems with Texas Governor Rick Perry’s optional flat tax may be the choice it gives taxpayers. Perry says you can either pay his new tax or pay under today’s system, whichever results in a lower bill. That sounds great, but it is a policy disaster. This is the tax code we’re [...]

There is lots we still don’t know about GOP presidential hopeful Rick Perry’s tax and budget plan. But I am pretty sure of one thing: The proposal he released today would result in a massive tax cut and, combined with his vow to balance the federal budget by 2020, implies huge reductions in federal spending.  Perry, [...]

Rick Perry is reportedly going to announce his tax reform plan, a so-called flat tax. There are, as far as I know, no details about the rate or exemption level of the tax or whether it will allow deductions for things like charitable contributions or mortgage interest.  So I can’t comment on the specific proposal, [...]

Of all the curious rhetoric floating around both Washington and the campaign trail, the strangest may be the demand of many Republicans that Congress raise taxes for low-income working households even as it cuts taxes for the wealthy.  The left has, not surprisingly, gleefully leapt on the issue. And, honestly, it seems like terrible politics [...]

Texas Governor Rick Perry, the latest entrant in the GOP presidential sweepstakes, swaggers into the race as the very personification of a low-tax, small-government, Lone Star politician. But his record on taxes over more than two decades as a legislator and governor turns out to be much more complicated (dare I say nuanced) than that. [...]