Over at National Affairs, Tevi Troy reviews the evolution–and, he believes, devaluation–of America’s think tanks. He leads off by noting how many think tanks have shifted toward political combat and rapid response and away from non-partisan research: One of the most peculiar, and least understood, features of the Washington policy process is the extraordinary dependence [...]
Archive for the ‘Politics’ Category
Lose an Election, Gain a Think Tank
Posted in Politics, tagged Think Tanks on January 4, 2012 | 10 Comments »
Flat-tax Simplicity with a Progressive Twist
Posted in Budget, Politics, Taxes on November 29, 2011 | Leave a Comment »
My latest column for the Christian Science Monitor. One of the perils of writing a monthly column is the multi-week lag between writing and publication. Rick Perry and Herman Cain were near the top of GOP contenders when I wrote this. Today? Not so much. But the ideas are still worth analysis. And Newt Gingrich [...]
Our Ever-Changing Tax Code
Posted in Budget, Politics, tagged Taxes on November 28, 2011 | Leave a Comment »
Graphic by Wesley Bedrosian as part of the Wall Street Journal’s weekend article on tax planning. After all, who doesn’t want to spend Thanksgiving weekend thinking about taxes?
Happy Anniversary, Tax Reform
Posted in Budget, Politics, tagged Politics, Taxes on October 22, 2011 | 2 Comments »
Twenty-five years ago today, President Ronald Reagan signed the Tax Reform Act of 1986 into law. Happy silver anniversary, tax reform! Over at the Tax Policy Center, Len Burman and Gene Steuerle, both Treasury staffers at the time, and Howard Gleckman, who covered the proceedings for BusinessWeek, offer personal reflections on how TRA86 happened and [...]
Taxes and Energy Policy
Posted in Budget, Energy, Environment, Politics, tagged Energy, Environment, Politics, Taxes on September 29, 2011 | 2 Comments »
Last week I had the opportunity to testify before two Ways and Means subcommittees–Select Revenue Measures and Oversight–about the way our tax system is used as a tool of energy policy. Here are my opening remarks. You can find my full testimony here. As you know, our tax system is desperately in need of reform. It’s needlessly complex, economically [...]
Deadlines, Deadlines, Deadlines
Posted in Budget, Politics, tagged Debt, Deficit on September 22, 2011 | 1 Comment »
My latest column for the Christian Science Monitor argues that a slew of budget deadlines will drive policy action this Fall. Case in point, the potential for a government shutdown when the government’s fiscal year ends next week. I don’t think that’s likely, at least not yet, but such deadlines will be the big thing this [...]
S&P’s $2 Trillion Error
Posted in Budget, Finance, Politics, tagged Budget, Debt, Deficit on August 7, 2011 | 22 Comments »
In the final hours before Friday’s historic downgrade, Standard & Poors gave Treasury an advance copy of its report. Amazingly, that report contained a $2 trillion error in its calculations of U.S. deficits and debt over the next decade. Here are four things you should know about it. 1. Treasury hoped that S&P would change its decision [...]
Five Things You Should Know About the S&P Downgrade
Posted in Budget, Finance, Politics, tagged Budget, Debt, Deficit, Interest Rates on August 5, 2011 | 11 Comments »
On Friday night, Standard and Poors announced that it was downgrading U.S. long-term sovereign debt from AAA to AA+, the first such downgrade in U.S. history. Here are five things you should know about the downgrade — four important, one trivia. 1. S&P downgraded U.S. debt not only because of the deteriorating fiscal outlook, but [...]
Debt Limit: Routine or the End of the World?
Posted in Budget, Politics, tagged Debt, Debt Limit, Humor, Politics on July 29, 2011 | 1 Comment »
Well, it certainly isn’t routine this time. Life was much simpler on the West Wing: This is a repost from May.
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