The Politics and Development of the Federal Income Tax

The Politics and Development of the Federal Income Tax PDF Author: John F. Witte
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 472

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Book Description
No program of the federal government has elicited so many calls for reform--and none has resisted reform efforts so consistently--as the income tax. In this book, John Witte provides the most detailed, clearly stated, accurate, and up-to-date exposition of the history of the federal income tax, while offering an acute analysis of the political factors that have shaped it over more than a century. This work is essential source material for all policy makers and policy analysts, and a lucid and comprehensive survey for students in public policy, public administration, budget and tax policy, political economy, and contemporary political theory. In short, Witte explains in graphic detail why the income tax remains in virtual chaos, and just what the prospects are of future reform. Witte's analysis is based in the context of incremental/pluralist policy-making theory. He begins by outlining and analyzing incremental theory and income tax policy, and then surveys past and present theories in income taxation. The broad center of the book consists of a detailed legislative and political history of the development of the income tax from the Civil War through the Reagan policies of the 1980s. Witte then offers an analysis of the growth, distribution, and politics of approximately one hundred tax expenditure provisions, and he concludes with an appraisal of recorded public opinions on income tax issues between 1948 and 1979. Witte's book, original in concept and boldly stated, will be essential reading not only for tax scholars, students, and professionals, but for all who are concerned with the form of American democracy and the political life of the nation.

The Politics of Income Taxation

The Politics of Income Taxation PDF Author: Steffen Ganghof
Publisher: ECPR Press
ISBN: 0954796683
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 209

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Book Description
Marginal income tax rates in advanced industrial countries have fallen dramatically since the mid-1980s, but levels and progressivity of income taxation continue to differ strongly across countries. This study offers a new perspective on both observations. It blends theoretical inquiry with focused quantitative analysis and in-depth investigation of seven countries: Germany, Australia and New Zealand as well as Denmark, Finland, Norway and Sweden. The Politics of Income Taxation highlights the equity-efficiency tradeoffs that structure the politics of income taxation, and analyses how income taxes are embedded in broader tax systems. It explains the limited but enduring importance of political parties and democratic institutions. Finally, the study paints a nuanced picture of the role of globalisation and thus sheds light on the pros and cons of tax coordination at European and international levels.

The Politics and Development of the Federal Income Tax

The Politics and Development of the Federal Income Tax PDF Author: John F. Witte
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 472

Get Book Here

Book Description
No program of the federal government has elicited so many calls for reform--and none has resisted reform efforts so consistently--as the income tax. In this book, John Witte provides the most detailed, clearly stated, accurate, and up-to-date exposition of the history of the federal income tax, while offering an acute analysis of the political factors that have shaped it over more than a century. This work is essential source material for all policy makers and policy analysts, and a lucid and comprehensive survey for students in public policy, public administration, budget and tax policy, political economy, and contemporary political theory. In short, Witte explains in graphic detail why the income tax remains in virtual chaos, and just what the prospects are of future reform. Witte's analysis is based in the context of incremental/pluralist policy-making theory. He begins by outlining and analyzing incremental theory and income tax policy, and then surveys past and present theories in income taxation. The broad center of the book consists of a detailed legislative and political history of the development of the income tax from the Civil War through the Reagan policies of the 1980s. Witte then offers an analysis of the growth, distribution, and politics of approximately one hundred tax expenditure provisions, and he concludes with an appraisal of recorded public opinions on income tax issues between 1948 and 1979. Witte's book, original in concept and boldly stated, will be essential reading not only for tax scholars, students, and professionals, but for all who are concerned with the form of American democracy and the political life of the nation.

The Politics of Income Inequality in the United States

The Politics of Income Inequality in the United States PDF Author: Nathan J. Kelly
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 0521514584
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 217

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Book Description
Using income surveys and various political-economic data, this book shows that income inequality is fundamental to the dynamics of US politics.

Tax Politics and Policy

Tax Politics and Policy PDF Author: Michael Thom
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
ISBN: 1317293355
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 272

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Book Description
Taxes are an inescapable part of life. They are perhaps the most economically consequential aspect of the relationship between individuals and their government. Understanding tax development and implementation, not to mention the political forces involved, is critical to fully appreciating and critiquing that relationship. Tax Politics and Policy offers a comprehensive survey of taxation in the United States. It explores competing theories of taxation’s role in civil society; investigates the evolution and impact of taxes on income, consumption, and assets; and highlights the role of interest groups in tax policy. This is the first book to include a separate look at "sin" taxes on tobacco, alcohol, marijuana, and sugar. The book concludes with a look at tax reform ideas, both old and new. This book is written for a broad audience—from upper-level undergraduates to graduate students in public policy, public administration, political science, economics, and related fields—and anyone else that has ever paid taxes.

The Politics of Taxation

The Politics of Taxation PDF Author: Susan B. Hansen
Publisher: Greenwood
ISBN:
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 318

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Book Description


Politics and Income Taxes

Politics and Income Taxes PDF Author: Marcus C. Berliant
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
This paper begins with a survey of the literature on the political economy approaches to labor income taxation. We focus on recent progress made by examining in detail the specific properties of non-linear taxes derived in the context of voting. Next, we present new results on the existence of majority voting equilibrium that unify work in the standard framework. Finally, we discuss how recent theoretical results help us uncover empirical patterns from the last 50 years in the US tax system, namely a sharp decrease in top marginal tax rates, the rise of the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC), and increased progressivity in the middle of the income distribution.

The New Economic Populism

The New Economic Populism PDF Author: William W. Franko
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0190671017
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 249

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Book Description
Donald Trump's 2016 victory shocked the world, but his appeals to the economic discontent of the white working class should not be so surprising, as stagnant wages for the many have been matched with skyrocketing incomes for the few. Though Trump received high levels of support from the white working class, once in office, the newly elected billionaire president appointed a cabinet with a net worth greater than one-third of American households combined. Furthermore, he pursued traditionally conservative tax, welfare state and regulatory policies, which are likely to make economic disparities worse. Nevertheless, income inequality has grown over the last few decades almost regardless of who is elected to the presidency and congress. There is a growing consensus among scholars that one of the biggest drivers of income inequality in the United States is government activity (or inactivity). Just as the New Deal and Great Society programs played a key role in leveling income distribution from the 1930s through the 1970s, federal policy since then has contributed to expanding inequality. Growing inequality bolsters the resources of the wealthy leading to greater influence over policy, and it contributes to partisan polarization. Both prevent the passage of policy to address inequality, creating a continuous feedback loop of growing inequality. The authors of this book argue that it is therefore misguided to look to the federal government, as citizens have tended to do since the New Deal, to lead on economic policy to "fix" inequality. In fact, they argue that throughout American history, during periods of rapid economic change the federal government has been stymied by the federal institutional design created by the Constitution. The winners of economic change have taken advantage of veto points to prevent change that would address the problems experienced by the losers of major economic change. Even the New Deal, in many ways the model of federal policy activism, was largely borrowed from policies created in the state "laboratories of democracy" in the preceding years and decades. The authors argue that in the current crisis of growing inequality we are seeing a similar dynamic and demonstrate that many states are actively addressing economic inequality. William Franko and Christopher Witko argue that the states that will address inequality are not necessarily those with the greatest objective inequality, but those where citizens are aware of growing inequality, where left-leaning politicians hold power, where unions are strong, and where the presence of direct democracy allow for more majoritarian public policy outcomes. In the empirical chapters Franko and Witko examine how these factors have shaped policies that boosted incomes at the bottom (the minimum wage and the Earned Income Tax Credit) and reduce incomes at the top (with top marginal tax rates) between 1987 and 2010. The authors argue that, if history is a guide, increasingly egalitarian policies at the state level will spread to other states and, eventually, to the federal level, setting the stage for a more equitable future.

The Permanent Tax Revolt

The Permanent Tax Revolt PDF Author: Isaac William Martin
Publisher: Stanford University Press
ISBN: 0804763178
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 376

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Book Description
Tax cuts are such a pervasive feature of the American political landscape that the political establishment rarely questions them. Since 2001, Congress has abolished the tax on inherited wealth and passed a major income tax cut every year, including two of the three largest income tax cuts in American history despite a long drawn-out war and massive budget deficits. The Permanent Tax Revolt traces the origins of this anti-tax campaign to the 1970s, in particular, to the influence of grassroots tax rebellions as homeowners across the United States rallied to protest their local property taxes. Isaac William Martin advances the provocative new argument that the property tax revolt was not a conservative backlash against big government, but instead a defensive movement for government protection from the market. The tax privilege that the tax rebels were defending was in fact one of the largest government social programs in the postwar era. While the movement to defend homeowners' tax breaks drew much of its inspiration—and many of its early leaders—from the progressive movement for welfare rights, politicians on both sides of the aisle quickly learned that supporting big tax cuts was good politics. In time, American political institutions and the strategic choices made by the protesters ultimately channeled the movement toward the kind of tax relief favored by the political right, with dramatic consequences for American politics today.

Tax and Spend

Tax and Spend PDF Author: Molly C. Michelmore
Publisher: University of Pennsylvania Press
ISBN: 0812206746
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 253

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Book Description
Taxes dominate contemporary American politics. Yet while many rail against big government, few Americans are prepared to give up the benefits they receive from the state. In Tax and Spend, historian Molly C. Michelmore examines an unexpected source of this contradiction and shows why many Americans have come to hate government but continue to demand the security it provides. Tracing the development of taxing and spending policy over the course of the twentieth century, Michelmore uncovers the origins of today's antitax and antigovernment politics in choices made by liberal state builders in the 1930s, 1940s, and 1950s. By focusing on two key instruments of twentieth-century economic and social policy, Aid to Families with Dependent Children and the federal income tax, Tax and Spend explains the antitax logic that has guided liberal policy makers since the earliest days of Franklin Roosevelt's presidency. Grounded in careful archival research, this book reveals that the liberal social compact forged during the New Deal, World War II, and the postwar years included not only generous social benefits for the middle class—including Social Security, Medicare, and a host of expensive but hidden state subsidies—but also a commitment to preserve low taxes for the majority of American taxpayers. In a surprising twist on conventional political history, Michelmore's analysis links postwar liberalism directly to the rise of the Republican right in the last decades of the twentieth century. Liberals' decision to reconcile public demand for low taxes and generous social benefits by relying on hidden sources of revenues and invisible kinds of public subsidy, combined with their persistent defense of taxpayer rights and suspicion of "tax eaters" on the welfare rolls, not only fueled but helped create the contours of antistate politics at the core of the Reagan Revolution.

Handbook on the Politics of Taxation

Handbook on the Politics of Taxation PDF Author: Hakelberg, Lukas 
Publisher: Edward Elgar Publishing
ISBN: 1788979427
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 432

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Book Description
This comprehensive Handbook provides an insight into the main concepts and academic debates on taxation from a political science perspective. Providing a background to current debates on green taxation, taxation and inequality, taxation and gender, tax evasion and avoidance, and tax compliance, it offers potential avenues for future research.