Robin, thanks for asking me back on Good Morning America to talk about my views on tax reform. After we spoke about gay marriage, I got to thinking about another deeply-held emotional issue that affects every American family. Well– you know, I have to tell you, as I’ve said, I’ve– I’ve been going through an [...]

In testimony before the Senate Committee on Finance this morning, I discussed what federal tax reform would mean for state and local governments and how Congress could help by coordinating tax law across states. Here are my opening remarks. You can find my full testimony here. With increasing concerns about the federal deficit, fairness, and the [...]

This afternoon, I moderated an interesting Tax Policy Center panel on taxing the rich. With the Senate about to debate a Buffett tax on millionaires, the timing couldn’t be better. Unfortunately for the White House, about the only thing the panelists agreed upon was that the Buffett tax is a terrible idea.   My fellow [...]

The tax code is chock full of credits, deductions, deferrals, exclusions, exemptions, and preferential rates. Taken together, such tax preferences will total almost $1.3 trillion this year. That’s a lot of money. But it doesn’t necessarily mean that $1.3 trillion is there for the picking in any upcoming deficit reduction or tax reform.  In fact, [...]

If you are interested in a serious but accessible look at my favorite topic—tax reform—check out two new books. One, The Benefit and the Burden  Tax Reform: Why We Need It and What It Will Take by Bruce Bartlett, focuses on individual reform. The second, Corporate Tax Reform: Taxing Profits in the 21st Century by Martin [...]

At first glance, it looked like President Obama and congressional Republicans were miraculously headed in the same direction on corporate tax reform. Reform plans by Obama and GOP leaders such as House Ways & Means Committee Dave Camp (R-MI) seemed simpatico. Both sides embraced lower rates. Both endorsed ending business tax subsidies, through neither had much to [...]

The President’s new Framework for Business Tax Reform is two documents in one. The first diagnoses the many flaws in America’s business tax system, and the second offers a framework for fixing them. Much of the resulting commentary has focused on the policy recommendations. But I’d like to give a shout out to the diagnosis. [...]

In the current issue of the journal The International Economy, ten economic thinkers shared their views on how best to restructure the tax system. Their opinions crossed the political spectrum, ranging from House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan (R-WI) to the Economic Policy Institute’s Andrew Fieldhouse. Two of my Tax Policy Center colleagues—TPC director Donald Marron [...]

The Paying a Fair Share Act of 2012 (PFSA) – Congress’ first crack at legislating the Buffett rule – would apply a broad-based 30 percent minimum tax for those earning more than $1 million a year. We have a pretty good idea of how this would affect people’s taxes: it would substantially raise them but [...]

Amidst the myriad proposals in President Obama’s budget are two “big ideas” that would raise revenue in a progressive manner without raising taxes. These important ideas should be emphasized in the discussion of tax and fiscal reform that the country should be having and will have to have sooner or later.  (The President also proposes [...]