SUBSCRIBE TO OUR FREE NEWSLETTER
Daily news & progressive opinion—funded by the people, not the corporations—delivered straight to your inbox.
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
tax day
Tax Day Realities: Nuclear Weapons and Our Dangerous, Misguided Priorities
An average American family of four will spend $1,606 dollars on nuclear weapons programs this year, and as a nation we are spending $261,092 every minute on weapons that cannot and must not ever be used without threatening all of humanity.
Apr 15, 2026
Each spring our nation funds our national budget on tax day, April 15. Just as the season itself is a time of renewal, this is a time to reflect on our priorities and who we are as a nation. Each of us can identify funding priorities in our collective daily experience and must ask ourselves if these are being addressed. From childcare and education to healthcare, national defense, and even nuclear weapons, we must set our priorities. With finite dollars and a myriad of national and international needs, we must be informed as to how these funds are being allocated.
Promises of affordability, reduced cost of living, and avoidance of costly wars have not coincided with reality.
Our planet continues to warm with progressive climate change, the last decade being the hottest decade in recorded history, causing increasing scarcity of natural resources further promoting conflict around the planet. Coupled with the potential for future global pandemics, this is a time when global cooperation and collaboration is more important than ever.
Unfortunately, we are pursuing policies of increased isolationism, feigning international cooperation with disdain for the international rule of law. We are pursuing wars, interventions and conflicts of choice, while walking away from international treaties, such as New START and the previous Iran nuclear deal, while bullying nations, thus empowering other nations to follow suit as international law and norms are shunned. We have seen 5 of the 9 nuclear-armed nations at war this past year with China increasing rhetorical threats against Taiwan. The twin interconnected existential threats of climate change and nuclear war seem ever closer. Recognizing this threat, the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists moved their symbolic Doomsday Clock to 85 seconds to midnight this past January, the closest it has been in its 79 year existence. This is a grim reminder of our increased reliance on luck to prevent a nuclear catastrophe, either by intent, miscalculation, or disruptive technology.
These expenditures rob our communities of precious resources that could be redirected to the actual needs of our citizens providing true security in meeting basic human needs and providing opportunity.
The very existence of nuclear weapons threatens all of us, and everything we hold near and dear, every moment of every day. These are weapons that can never be used. With a perverse logic, as if in a trance to the end, we have chosen as a nation to increase our nuclear weapons program expenditures year over year, further proving the fallacy of deterrence as each of our adversaries do likewise so as not to be outdone.
According to the US Nuclear Weapons Community Cost Project, now in its 37th year, this Fiscal Year 2026 finds the US spending over $137 billion dollars on all nuclear weapons programs. That equates to an average of $401.51 for every man, woman, and child based on an average income of $44,673. These costs affect every community across our nation, from New York City, our richest city, spending over $3.95 Billion; to Flint Michigan, our poorest city, spending over $15.565 million; to the Navajo Nation spending over $28.491 Million. An average American family of four will spend $1,606 dollars on nuclear weapons programs this year, and as a nation we are spending $261,092 every minute on weapons that cannot and must not ever be used without threatening all of humanity.
Where does this fit into your priorities as you think about your family and the future you envision? These expenditures rob our communities of precious resources that could be redirected to the actual needs of our citizens providing true security in meeting basic human needs and providing opportunity.
This is a situation that does not have to be, but one that will not change without public support and outcry. There is a growing national grassroots campaign called Back From the Brink bringing communities together to prevent nuclear war. The movement calls for the US to take a leadership role as follows:
- Actively pursuing a verifiable agreement among nuclear-armed states to eliminate their nuclear arsenals;
- Renouncing the option of using nuclear weapons first;
- Ending the sole, unchecked authority of any US president to launch a nuclear attack;
- Taking US nuclear weapons off hair-trigger alert; and
- Cancelling the plan to replace the entire US nuclear arsenal with enhanced weapons.
With over 504 national organizations, 78 municipalities and counties, eight state legislative bodies, 592 municipal and state official, and 68 members of Congress endorsing, support is growing. Each of us can endorse the campaign, join a local hub, and call on our elected officials to add their name to the growing list of local and federal officials who endorse and support this effort.
We all have a role to play in pursuing a future for our children and future generations. That role is unique to us and not necessarily a large role or a small role, it is our role. If our luck holds out, when our children’s children ask, what did you do when the planet was threatened, how will you respond? Working together we can make nuclear weapons a threat of the past.
Keep ReadingShow Less
Tell Congress to Stop Spending Your Tax Dollars on Nuclear Weapons
We have the answer to realize significant cost savings, while simultaneously promoting sound fiscal policies that benefit us all and don’t threaten the survival of the human race.
Apr 16, 2025
This week was the week that our 2024 taxes were due in order to fund the fiscal year 2025 federal budget and thus our nation’s priorities. This year’s budget represents the final Biden budget. It comes at a time when our country is in a deliberate state of chaos instituted by the current administration. Under the non-elected efforts of the Department of Government Efficiency and current cabinet, we find punitive and seemingly random disjointed cutting of essential services and vital programs in addition to international aid that cuts to the core of who America is.
U.S. Congress has just passed a budget resolution requiring $1.5 trillion in savings to be realized over the next 10 years. Ultimately, budgets are moral documents. How do the current cuts, in addition to planned cuts in entitlement programs such as Medicaid, Medicare, and Social Security, address our needs and follow a moral compass? How does funding nuclear weapons factor in when addressing our needs and priorities?
This year’s federal tax expenditure for all nuclear weapons programs will be $110,344,000,000. This figure was released on Tax Day in this year’s U.S. Nuclear Weapons Community Cost Project. That amounts to $3,499 per second. This year will see an increase of roughly $15.8 billion over FY 2024. Congress prides itself in being fiscally responsible. Yet when cities like Detroit are spending over $114 million on nuclear weapons programs, Atlanta over $245 million, Chicago over $961 million, and the impoverished Navajo nation of roughly 113,000 people are spending over $18 million, where is the rationale, fiscal responsibility, and sanity?
Unlike a nuclear missile that cannot be recalled after launch, the nuclear arms race and existing arsenals can be reversed and nuclear weapons can be eliminated.
The continuation of this out-of-control escalation is fueled by the myth of deterrence with dramatic increases in weapons delivery systems and missile defeat and defense expenditures. The latter is the present day version of former President Ronald Reagan’s “Strategic Defense Initiative” or “Star Wars.” Today’s version continues the elusive and easily outfoxed goal of hitting a bullet with a bullet to defend us coupled with a complex early detection system. With roughly 12,331 nuclear weapons in today’s global arsenals, the world remains closer to nuclear war than at any point in the past 80 years since the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists puts our current risk at 89 seconds to midnight and nuclear Armageddon. That risk assessment comes from the current geopolitical turmoil; climate change; and evolving disruptive technologies that increase the risk of nuclear war either by intent, miscalculation, or accident presenting a very real and present danger. Everything and everyone we care about is threatened with the distinct possibility of ending the human race.
Ultimately, the only way to prevent a nuclear war is to abolish these weapons. Unlike a nuclear missile that cannot be recalled after launch, the nuclear arms race and existing arsenals can be reversed and nuclear weapons can be eliminated. What is needed is the political will. The people need to speak, and when the people lead, the leaders will follow.
Fortunately, there is a U.S. grassroots movement, Back From the Brink, bringing diverse communities together to eliminate nuclear weapons. This movement calls on the United States to take a leadership role in bringing together the world’s nuclear powers to negotiate a time-bound, verifiable, and complete elimination of all nuclear weapons. It includes four precautionary measures to safeguard against nuclear war until that goal is achieved. These include renouncing the option of using nuclear weapons first; ending the sole, unchecked authority of any U.S. president to launch a nuclear attack; taking U.S. weapons off of hair-trigger alert; and canceling the plan to replace the entire U.S. nuclear arsenal with enhanced weapons.
Anyone can endorse this campaign. Presently 495 organizations, 78 municipalities and counties, eight state legislative bodies, 430 municipal and state officials, and 44 members of Congress have endorsed this campaign.
Last week Rep. Jim McGovern (D-Mass.) introduced U.S. House Res. 317, which lays out how we can fundamentally reform U.S. nuclear weapons policy and achieve a world free of nuclear weapons. In addition to supporting the policy points of Back From the Brink, this resolution supports: the maintenance of a de facto global moratorium on nuclear testing, protecting communities and workers affected by nuclear weapons by fully remediating their deadly legacy of environmental contamination past and current, and actively pursuing a just economic transition for the civilian and military workforce involved in this entire nuclear cycle.
We have the answer to realize significant cost savings, while simultaneously promoting sound fiscal policies that benefit us all. With life itself hanging in the balance we all must demand a meeting with our legislative leaders, urging them to endorse this legislation. If they refuse, we must ask why they are willing to put everything at risk?
Correction: An earlier version of this article said that taxpayers would pay $3,498,985.29 per second for nuclear weapons this year. The actual figure is $3,499 per second. The piece has been updated to reflect this.
Keep ReadingShow Less
Ready to Punish the Poor in Their Districts, 7 Out of 10 GOP Lawmakers Set to Benefit From Trump Tax Scam
"Put simply: at a time when costs continue to rise for everyday Americans, this tax day, Congressional Republicans aren't focused on making their constituents' lives better," said one watchdog.
Apr 15, 2025
To honor Tax Day, a watchdog group is highlighting research showing how 70% of congressional Republicans may see personal financial benefit from the party's tax plan, now making its way through Congress, which would likely be paid for in part by deep cuts to Medicaid and through cuts to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP).
According to Accountable.US, a progressive research and advocacy group, "270,000 households in many of the lowest-income Republican congressional districts could lose SNAP benefits while their representatives potentially save millions."
"While millions prepare their returns, the Trump administration and their lackeys in Congress are eagerly seeking a way to rob their constituents of vital services and pay for tax giveaways to themselves, their billionaire donors, and mega corporations," Tony Carrk, the group's executive director, said in a statement Tuesday.
"Put simply: at a time when costs continue to rise for everyday Americans, this tax day, Congressional Republicans aren't focused on making their constituents' lives better; instead they’re focused on gutting programs Americans rely on and cutting taxes for those doing just fine."
As part of its spending and tax plan, Republicans are aiming to extend expiring provisions of Trump's 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, a move that would disproportionately benefit the wealthy.
The provisions set to expire include a 20% deduction for "pass-through" businesses—whose owners report their share of profits as taxable income under the individual income tax—and the current estate tax exemption amount. If the estate tax TCJA exemption were to expire, the exemption would drop down to $7 million per individual, meaning more millionaires would be forced to pay federal estate tax.
Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D) also recently endorsed a full repeal of the estate tax, which is a tax applied to assets inherited by others when a wealthy person dies.
The pass-through deduction and estate tax are two benefits that are tilted toward the wealthy, according to Accountable.US, which focused on these two benefits when building their "Cash in Congress" database.
To compile the data, the group looked at lawmakers' most recent federal annual disclosure, and counted them within the 70% of lawmakers set to gain from the tax plan if they are set to benefit from the pass-through deduction.
Some lawmakers are also poised to benefit from keeping the TCJA estate tax exemption amount in place. According to Accountable.US, 18% of Republican House members and 28% of Senate Republicans are wealthy enough that they are currently subject to the estate tax. They would also pay even less in estate taxes if the provision was fully repealed.
Specifically, the 10 wealthiest House Republicans are threatening Medicaid access for 1.7 million of their own constituents, among the poorest in their districts, according to a statement from the group when they launched the database last week.
Accountable.US also highlights the situation of individual members who may benefit.
Rep. Diana Harshbarger (R-Tenn.) is a member of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, which is tasked with coming up with spending cuts that will likely impact Medicaid. Per Accountable.US, she could benefit from the repeal of the estate tax after reporting over $40 million in assets on her most recent annual financial disclosure.
Meanwhile, according to the group, her district has a median household income that is over 20,000 below the U.S. median household income, and 14.3% of adults have income below the poverty line. Over 35,000 of the households she represents receive SNAP benefits.
Keep ReadingShow Less
It's Tax Day. You've Paid Your Share, But the Billionaires Haven't
Shutting down special tax breaks for very wealthy individuals and profitable corporations would go a long way to addressing our nation's deepest problems.
Apr 15, 2025
Today our 2024 taxes are due. You likely had most of your federal taxes deducted from your paychecks throughout the year. This is not true, however, for mega-millionaires and billionaires, some of whom are practically running our government right now. They receive much of their income in the form of appreciation on the stocks of the corporations they run. And the companies themselves use loopholes and deductions to reduce their tax bill, sometimes down to zero.
Take Tesla (please!).
The company, valued at over $1 trillion, paid no federal income tax on its 2024 income of $2.3 billion. And its CEO, Elon Musk, who had hoarded some $342 billion in wealth by earlier this year, avoids paying taxes on most of his income until he chooses to “realize” capital gains by selling his enormously appreciated stock.
Because of our overall low taxes, the U.S. does not collect as much revenue as other comparable nations. This means you get a lot less by being an American citizen than you get by being a French, German or Swedish citizen. Less health care, less child care, less access to affordable college.
These low taxes are part of the reason that America experiences supercharged inequality. While other countries do more to boost people at the bottom and enable upward mobility for the middle class, in the U.S. low taxes combined with an anti-worker, anti-consumer, anti-environment regulatory regime means that here the rich get richer and the rest of us stagnate.
A regime of relatively robust taxation and reasonable regulation delivered a more educated, healthier, more prosperous America.
Further, the extreme wealth of the billionaire class often lets them buy the elected officials and the policies they want—usually policies that add further to their riches in a vicious cycle that leaves most of us worse off. President Trump has given Musk the power to fire tens of thousands of workers, eliminate funding for hospitals and universities around the country, and destroy Congressionally-created agencies that carry out vital public functions.
Shutting down special tax breaks for very wealthy individuals and profitable corporations could go a long way to addressing these problems. But Trump and his allies in Congress are moving dramatically in the opposite direction. While they plan to double down on tax cuts that mainly benefit the wealthy, they are also allowing the most destructive billionaire-driven attack we’ve ever seen on the policies that keep us healthy and safe.
Musk is wielding a chainsaw against public services using his so-called DOGE (“Department of Government Efficiency” though it’s not a government agency and will likely undermine efficiency). DOGE’s cuts to services could decimate education, health, and income support. And its cuts to public oversight will enable corporations to more easily exploit us as workers, consumers, and community members.
For example, Trump and Musk are trying to eliminate the Department of Education and slash school budgets in ways that will particularly harm children with disabilities, students in disadvantaged rural and urban schools, and college access for working class kids.
They’ve fired 10,000 staff members at the Department of Health and Human Services, including those who ensure vaccine distribution, drug safety, and health care access. They’ve haphazardly slashed funding nationwide for labs conducting medical research on cancer, Alzheimer’s disease, maternal health, and more.
They tried to get rid of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB), an agency which has recovered more than $21 billion for consumers from companies that engage in unfair, deceptive, or abusive practices. And they even slashed the Federal Emergency Management Association which helps communities facing floods, hurricanes, and wildfires, leaving communities unprotected.
Their reasons are three-fold, all bad for regular people:
- Cutting public services can free policymakers to pass expensive tax cuts for the wealthiest people and corporations.
- It can also allow privatization of services so Musk and others can demand payment to provide them.
- Finally by hobbling regulations and firing public employees that safeguard factories, inspect meat, and test drugs, Musk hopes to juice corporate profits as CEOs are permitted to shed factory safety equipment, ignore anti-pollution rules, and violate labor laws.
This doesn’t even begin to touch on the crazy on-again, off-again tariffs that are roiling our financial markets and industrial supply chains.
Policymakers of the 20th century created regulations, safety nets, and labor standards that made Americans more educated, more prosperous, and healthier. They didn’t work perfectly of course. But education, income, and health improved dramatically over this span.
Educational investments boosted high school attainment rates for adults from a mere 10 percent in 1910 to 90 percent by 2017. With more education and unionization, inflation-adjusted per capita income went from $18,460 in 1967 to $46,193 by 2023. Research and vaccination nearly eradicated polio, smallpox, and measles. And safety standards meant the number of workers killed on the job plummeted from 15.8 to 1.9 per 100,000 between 1928 (when tracking began) and 1998. The big picture: life expectancy at birth nearly doubled (from 46.6 years to 74.7 years) for white men and more than doubled (from 32.5 years to 68.2 years) for Black men between 1900 and the year 2000.
In other words, a regime of relatively robust taxation and reasonable regulation delivered a more educated, healthier, more prosperous America. In 2025, it seems, Trump and those he enables are trying to make American impoverished again by rolling back the 20th century and its accomplishments.
Keep ReadingShow Less
Why You Should Take Advantage of IRS Direct File This Tax Season
Widespread participation will help solidify the future of this important service amid the chaos in the federal government.
Apr 11, 2025
With Tax Day rapidly approaching, taxpayers who haven’t yet filed could have a great option available to them this year. Half the states in the nation now have access to a zero-cost tool created by the Internal Revenue Service called Direct File that allows people to file taxes online directly to the government using a question-based software.
Direct File is a much better option than paying for expensive corporate-owned software or hiring a private tax-prep company. The typical taxpayer ends up spending an average of eight hours each year completing their tax returns in addition to shelling out $160 a year to pay for a service that should be—and is now—free of charge.
Last year, Direct File software was made available through a pilot program to those with relatively simple tax situations living in Arizona, California, Florida, Massachusetts, Nevada, New Hampshire, New York, Texas, Tennessee, South Dakota, Washington, and Wyoming.
The user testimonials speak for themselves. “It was the fastest I’ve ever done my taxes,” said one user. “I wish everyone could do their taxes that easily,” said another.
This year, in addition to the 12 states from last year’s pilot program, all of which are participating again, Direct File has been expanded to include Alaska, Connecticut, Idaho, Illinois, Kansas, Maine, Maryland, New Jersey, New Mexico, North Carolina, Oregon, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin.
Approximately 30 million people across the 25 participating states are eligible to use Direct File. And there are many reasons to welcome this new e-file tool created by the IRS.
Direct File was designed to make it as easy as possible for people to file taxes. In addition to being free of charge, the tool is mobile-friendly, available in both English and Spanish, and has live chat assistance from the IRS. What’s more, the tool now pre-populates some information that the IRS already has in its records to make the process even quicker and error-free, which is a huge improvement over its original version.
What’s more, Direct File is intended to help people claim credits like the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC), which around one in five eligible filers don’t currently claim.
Research shows that when Direct File is fully scaled up, Americans could collectively save up to $11 billion in filing costs alone, while low and moderate-income families could recoup $12 billion in tax credits like the EITC and Child Tax Credit that they’re currently missing out on. That money could come in handy for families struggling to make ends meet in these times of rising costs.
Predictably, Direct File is overwhelmingly popular with the American public. More than 90% of people who used Direct File last year said that the tool is “Excellent” or “Above average.”
The user testimonials speak for themselves. “It was the fastest I’ve ever done my taxes,” said one user. “I wish everyone could do their taxes that easily,” said another.
It’s not just popular with those who’ve used it. Direct File has been cheered by more than 140 members of Congress; 16 attorneys general; 134 leading experts on the U.S. tax system; and more than 250 national, state, and local organizations representing all 50 states, the District of Columbia, and Puerto Rico.
During his confirmation hearing, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said he would commit to keeping Direct File in 2025. However, amid the current chaos happening in the federal government, its future in 2026 and beyond is less certain. Big tax prep corporations have been handing out cash to opponents of Direct File in Congress in the hopes of gutting the program.
For Direct File to remain an option in future years, it’s critical that taxpayers take advantage of the tool right now. Widespread participation will help solidify the future of this important service.
So if you haven’t filed your taxes yet, go to directfile.irs.gov to see if you’re eligible.
Keep ReadingShow Less
All I Want for Tax Day Is a Reversal of Trump’s Regressive Tax Cuts
Like the Bush tax cuts before it, the Trump tax cut was a trickle-down failure.
Apr 15, 2024
Happy Tax Day. As Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes said, “Taxes are the price we pay for a civilized society.”
But who should pay the most for this civilized society? As Adam Smith, the father of modern economics, instructed in his The Wealth of Nations, a tax system should be based on the principle of equal sacrifice. This means the richer should pay a larger share of their incomes in taxes than the poorer.
But today’s wealthy Americans are paying a much smaller share of their incomes in taxes than most Americans.
Which is why the debate that’s already begun over the 2025 expiration of the Trump tax cuts is so illuminating and important.
Whenever you hear Republicans complain about the federal budget deficit, bear this in mind: The Bush and Trump tax cuts are the major culprits.
The major reason some very wealthy people are backing former President Donald Trump is they want the Trump tax cuts to become permanent and not expire as scheduled in 2025.
As this debate unfolds, you should know four basic facts. The Trump tax cut that went into effect in January 2018 is:
- Skewed to the rich. Households with incomes in the top 1% will receive an average tax cut of more than $60,000 in 2025, compared to an average tax cut of less than $500 for households in the bottom 60%, according to the Tax Policy Center. As a share of after-tax income, tax cuts at the top—for both households in the top 1% and the top 5%—are more than triple the total value of the tax cuts received for people with incomes in the bottom 60%.
- Expensive. The Congressional Budget Office estimated in 2018 that the Trump tax cut would cost $1.9 trillion over 10 years. Recent estimates show that making the law’s individual income and estate tax cuts permanent would cost another $350 billion a year beginning in 2027. Together with the 2001 and 2003 tax cuts enacted under George W. Bush (most of which were made permanent in 2012), these laws have severely eroded America’s revenue base.
- Budget-busting. Federal tax revenue as a share has fallen from about 19.5% of the total economy in the years preceding the Bush tax cuts to just 16.3% of the economy in the years following the Trump tax cuts. Whenever you hear Republicans complain about the federal budget deficit, bear this in mind: The Bush and Trump tax cuts are the major culprits. Moreover, the relatively smaller share of the economy financing the federal government is not enough to pay for the nation’s investment needs and our commitments to Social Security and health coverage.
- Based on a “trickle-down” lie. Trump claimed that the corporate tax cut would “very conservatively” lead to a $4,000 boost in household income. Research shows that workers who earned less than about $114,000 on average in 2016 saw no change in earnings from Trump’s corporate tax rate cut, while top executive salaries increased sharply. Similarly, research has shown that the law’s 20% pass-through deduction, which was skewed in favor of wealthy business owners, has failed to trickle down to workers in those companies who aren’t owners. Like the Bush tax cuts before it, the Trump tax cut was a trickle-down failure.
More generally, trickle-down economics—the abiding faith on the political right that tax cuts as well as deregulation are good for an economy—continues to live on, notwithstanding its repeated failures. Ever since former U.S. President Ronald Reagan and former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher first tried them, trickle-down policies have exploded budget deficits and widened inequality.
Reagan’s tax cuts and deregulation at the start of the 1980s were not responsible for America’s rapid growth through the late 1980s. His exorbitant spending (mostly on national defense) fueled a temporary boom that ended in a fierce recession.
Yet the U.S. never restored the highest marginal tax rates before Reagan. And deregulation—especially of financial markets—is a continuing harmful legacy.
The result? From 1989 to 2021, typical working families in the United States saw negligible increases in their real (inflation-adjusted) incomes and wealth.
Over the same period, the wealthiest 1% of Americans became $29 trillion richer. The national debt exploded. And Wall Street’s takeover of the economy continued.
Meanwhile, and largely as a result, Americans have become more bitterly divided along the fissures of class and education.
So why is trickle-down economics still with us? What explains the fatal attraction of this repeatedly failed economic theory?
The easiest answer is that it satisfies politically powerful moneyed interests who want to rake in even more. Armies of lobbyists continuously demand tax cuts and “regulatory relief” for their wealthy patrons.
But why has the public been repeatedly willing to go along with trickle-down economics when nothing ever trickles down? What accounts for the collective amnesia?
The answer is that the moneyed interests have also invested a portion of their gains in an intellectual infrastructure of economists and pundits who continue to promote this failed doctrine—along with institutions that house them, such as The Heritage Foundation, Cato Institute, and Club for Growth.
Consider Stephen Moore, the founder and past president of the Club for Growth and a leading economist at The Heritage Foundation, whose columns appear regularly in The Wall Street Journal and who is a frequent guest on Fox News.
Moore helped draft and promote Trump’s trickle-down tax. He is now advising Trump on making that tax cut permanent, if Trump returns to the White House next year.
Moore and others like him are happy to disregard the evidence and history of trickle-down’s abject failures. They simply repeat the same set of promises made decades ago when Reagan and Thatcher set out to convince the public that trickle-down would work splendidly.
The public has so much else on its mind and is so confused by the cacophony that it doesn’t remember—until immediately after the next trickle-down failure.
If Democrats take over both houses of Congress in 2024, and President Joe Biden gets a second term, they must reverse the regressive tilt of the Trump tax law—raising more revenue while advancing the interests of low- and moderate-income families across the country rather than those of the wealthy. To achieve this:
- Tax cuts for people making over $400,000 should end on schedule in 2025. The Trump tax law’s provisions primarily benefiting high-income households are costly and do not trickle down.
- The tax system must raise more revenue from wealthy people and profitable corporations to offset tax cuts extended or expanded for those with incomes below $400,000, to finance high-value investments in people and communities, and to improve the federal budget outlook.
- New progressive tax policies should be enacted to reduce the ability of the wealthy to avoid taxes on their large unrealized capital gains and roll back the special breaks they receive when they do pay tax. Policymakers can also generate progressive revenues by extending and making permanent the mandatory IRS funding enacted in the Inflation Reduction Act, which supports revenues by increasing tax collections primarily from high-income households.
- Top priorities for extending and expanding tax provisions in 2025 should be the Child Tax Credit, the Earned Income Tax Credit for adults not raising children, and the enhanced premium tax credits for Affordable Care Act marketplace coverage. These credits have a long history of success—in stark contrast to the record of failure of the corporate tax rate cut and regressive tax cuts on wealthy individuals. This includes a marked drop in the child poverty rate in 2021 under the American Rescue Plan’s expansion of the Child Tax Credit—a policy that should be made permanent in 2025.
- Additionally, some 16 million people who work for low wages and who are not raising children in their homes received help through the Rescue Plan’s EITC expansion in 2021, and there were historic gains in the number of people receiving health coverage in the ACA marketplaces during the 2024 open enrollment season, with most enrollees able to find coverage for less than $10 per month. These should continue.
- Revenues also can be used for additional services Americans need. The costs of childcare, home-based care for older adults and people with disabilities, and housing remain unacceptably high for millions of families, and federal investment in these areas falls far short of need. Higher taxes on the wealthy will help offset these costs.
Keep ReadingShow Less
Our Budget Priorities Should Reflect the People's Agenda, Not Hasten Nuclear Oblivion
This fiscal year 2024, the United States will spend $94.485 billion on all nuclear weapons programs, an increase of over $4 billion from last year.
Apr 15, 2024
Today, April 15, is the day we fund our nation's priorities as determined by our elected leaders.
Last month the United Way released its 2023 211 Impact Survey of roughly 16 million requests, offering insights into the trends and challenges faced by households and communities across the country. Topping the list were housing, utilities, and food assistance as the top needs of people seeking support nationwide. Similarly, a Gallop poll released last month listed the economy, inflation, hunger and homelessness, and healthcare costs in the top five priorities.
Where do nuclear weapons fit in? They're not even on the radar of most people, and particularly not mainstream news outlets. Yet this fiscal year 2024, the United States will spend $94.485 billion on all nuclear weapons programs. This is an increase of over $4 billion from last year. This expenditure is for weapons that can never be used without posing a threat to all of humanity. Yet these expenditures continue to grow out of control, year over year. It is fueled by the mythology of nuclear deterrence, the major driver of the arms race. Not to be outdone, every country feels driven to exceed the nuclear forces and capabilities of their adversaries. We spiral out of control toward nuclear oblivion, ever increasing the potential for nuclear war either by intent, miscalculation, or accident.
The nuclear abolition movement is here and growing.
Nuclear weapons threaten us every moment of every day. There are 12,119 weapons in the global nuclear arsenals. We know that the use of even a tiny fraction, less than one-half of 1% of these weapons over a single populated region, could cause catastrophic climate change lasting years and potentially putting 2 billion people at risk.
With this nuclear famine knowledge, the new arms race shifts from the paradigm of (MAD) Mutually Assured Destruction to (SAD) Self Assured Destruction. These weapons rob our communities of precious resources that could be redirected to the many needs that our communities cry out for. The very existence of nuclear weapons and programs is an economic, environmental, social, and racial justice issue. Yet this is a situation that does not have to be.
Back From the Brink is a growing movement across this nation. It calls for a no-first-use policy, ending sole presidential authority to launch nuclear weapons, ending "hair trigger alert," canceling the plans to replace the entire arsenal with new weapons, and most importantly, resumption of negotiations for a multilateral, verifiable treaty for the elimination of nuclear weapons. This campaign is supported by U.S. House Resolution 77, which embraces the goals and provisions of the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons and each of the precautionary measures in the Back From the Brink campaign. The resolution currently has 44 cosponsors in the U.S. House of Representatives.
This past year has seen heightened awareness of the threat of nuclear weapons moving into the mainstream with the release of the Academy Award-winning film Oppenheimer; The New York Times series "At the Brink," with an in-depth overview of the risk and potential impacts of nuclear war; last week's Boston Globe editorial "We Need to Start Worrying About the Bomb;" and the recently published books Nuclear War: A Scenario by Annie Jacobsen and Countdown: The Blinding Future of Nuclear Weapons by Sarah Scoles.
The nuclear abolition movement is here and growing. It is time for our budget priorities to reflect the people's agenda and to abolish nuclear weapons before they abolish us.
Keep ReadingShow Less
Voters Want Tax Day to Look Different for Billionaires
New polling from the National Women’s Law Center and MomsRising found that nearly 80% of respondents supported increasing investments in the caregiving agenda by raising taxes on the wealthiest and big corporations.
Apr 15, 2024
Women and families shouldn’t have to struggle to meet caregiving needs while billionaires buy their third yacht and mega corporations see record profits. This Tax Day, while most of us are stressing about filing our tax returns correctly, many billionaires will laugh all the way to the bank as they pay
a lower tax rate than their secretaries.
New polling from the National Women’s Law Center and MomsRising shows us that respondents are sick of this status quo, and that they overwhelmingly support raising taxes on the richest to invest in care priorities.
For years, lawmakers on both sides of the aisle have insisted that if we give tax cuts to those at the top, everyone will feel the benefits. Fifty years of research has decidedly disproven this theory.
Imagine instead a tax system where the richest pay their fair share, which allows us to invest in our shared priorities.
Tax giveaways for the wealthiest and biggest corporations don’t create jobs or raise salaries; instead, they help pad bonuses for top executives and boost payouts for wealthy shareholders. And in some cases, profitable companies can avoid paying federal taxes entirely.
Meanwhile, families are struggling to hold it together.
Childcare prices h+ave continued to surge as childcare programs grapple with waning resources after the expiration of federal childcare funding in September.
Women, and predominantly women in low-paid work, are forced to choose between caring for a loved one or keeping their job.
And a lack of robust public investment has decimated our ability to provide good quality home and community-based care for aging and disabled people.
Furthermore, the people who work in these care roles and who are—you guessed it—predominantly women, are driven into poverty or out of the workforce by unsustainable wages and poor working conditions.
Yet, instead of collecting more tax revenue from those at the top so that we can invest in our chronically underfunded care systems, Republicans have decided to double down on the disastrous course of more tax cuts for the wealthiest.
All of us will need to care for ourselves or a family member at some point in our lives, and many of us provide care for a living. If the wealthiest individuals and corporations simply paid their fair share in taxes, there would be more than enough to invest in childcare, paid leave, and aging and disability care, which would help our families and our economy thrive.
President Joe Biden knows this. Just last month, he stood before Congress and declared: “If you want to make—or can make—a million or millions of bucks, that’s great. Just pay your fair share in taxes.”
He proposed a minimum tax of 25% on billionaires, which would raise $500 billion in 10 years, and called for investing that revenue in paid leave, home care, and childcare.
It’s no surprise that line prompted thunderous applause. The president knows that connecting taxes to the investments that would make a difference in the lives of women and families is a winning message. New polling from the National Women’s Law Center and MomsRising found that nearly 80% of respondents were supportive of increasing investments in the caregiving agenda by raising taxes on the wealthiest and big corporations.
Women are disproportionately burdened by our lack of equitable caregiving investments, and this polling reaffirms that focusing on how taxes can support gender justice priorities could sway voters to Biden’s side. For instance, two key voting demographics, Black women and Gen Z women, consistently and strongly support the care agenda that President Biden is pushing according to this poll.
In stark contrast, the Republican candidate, former President Donald Trump, has been privately talking about cutting the corporate tax rate even further, similar to what he did in his 2017 Republican-passed tax bill, the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act. This is not only a terrible idea for our country and our economy, but also for his campaign.
The new survey results showed that two-thirds of voters across party lines agreed that we need to get rid of the disastrous 2017 tax cuts for the wealthiest, a sentiment that is consistent with poll after poll over the past five years.
Since this bill was signed into law, billionaire wealth has increased by more than $2 trillion (a 77% increase) at a time when the child poverty rate has more than doubled. What’s more, since 2017, this tax law exploded the national debt and decimated federal tax revenue.
Imagine instead a tax system where the richest pay their fair share, which allows us to invest in our shared priorities. That’s the future tax code that President Biden wants to create. And our polling shows that voters overwhelmingly want to increase investments in the care priorities that families need by raising taxes on the wealthiest.
Tax Day may be in April, but voters will be thinking about taxes until November.
Keep ReadingShow Less
I Want My Taxes to Be Used for Our True National Security: Helping People in Need
I want my tax money to “beat swords into plowshares” by supplanting masculinist militarism with intelligent, committed, unrelenting diplomacy and a strong social safety net.
Apr 15, 2024
In June 2023 Amanda Jones, an African American who had recently given birth to her second daughter Miranda, died from pregnancy-related causes. Her state, Georgia, ranks among the least safe states in the country for women to give birth; and the vast majority of women who die during and after pregnancy are poor and disproportionately African American.
Though Amanda and her partner worked, they did not have health insurance and she was only eligible for Medicaid coverage for up to 12 months after the birth of her child, none for prenatal care, and none after 12 months. The majority of the nearly 26 million uninsured people are low-income families with at least one worker, with no healthcare coverage through their job, and who cannot afford the high cost of private insurance. Further, millions of Americans are losing Medicaid coverage as some states restrict eligibility that was expanded during the Covid-19 pandemic. All the while, corporate healthcare capitalists are raking in record profits—the largest gaining $41 billion in profits in 2022.
I want my taxes to help fund universal healthcare for everyone in our country. All but 43 countries offer free healthcare or access to healthcare for at least 90% of their citizens. Why cannot we, the world’s wealthiest nation for over 60 years, divorce ourselves from corporate capitalist healthcare?
Our arduous path back from flawed to healthy democracy will only be through engaged citizens, activist organizations, and unions in cities and some states not shackled in the stranglehold of anti-abortion, anti-immigrant, Trumpian, and extreme religious right politics, nor held hostage by their weapons manufacturers.
What of other social and economic issues to consider this Tax Day? Take poverty: 140 million people— 40% of U.S. people—are poor or near poor, defined as one emergency away from economic ruin, according to the Poor People’s Campaign. The “140 million” are people of every race, ethnicity, age, faith, sex, and sexual orientation, while poverty is highest among Black, Latino, and Indigenous peoples due to systemic racism. More women than men are poor due to systemic sexism. The pay gap between women and men—21.8% on average—has persisted for 30 years, an injustice that deteriorates our democracy.
I want my federal and state taxes to lift people out of poverty and end inequality in income. It can be done. Cities are leading the way in raising minimum wage; and they outpace the best states, while the federal minimum wage languishes at a despicable $7.25 per hour
These 10 Cities have the highest minimum wage in the U.S.
- Tukwila, Washington: $20.29
- Seattle, Washington: $19.97
- SeaTac, Washington: $19.71
- West Hollywood, California: $19.08
- Mountain View, California: $18.75
- Emeryville, California: $18.67
- Sunnyvale, California: $18.55
- Denver, Colorado: $18.29
Today, the highest minimum wages, by state and Washington, D.C., are in D.C., ($17), Washington ($16.28), California ($16), Connecticut ($15.69), and New Jersey ($15.13). New York has raised its minimum hourly wage in New York City and its suburbs to $16.
But we need to do better: A livable wage in Connecticut—that is, an hourly wage that enables a single adult to pay for necessities, including housing, food, utilities, transportation, and healthcare—would be $24.13. Overall, most single Americans need to earn at least $20 an hour to pay their bills, given the cost of living where they live. More than one-third fall short.
I want my federal and state tax money used to raise minimum wage to a livable wage in the name of economic justice for everyone.
In 2023, the Department of Defense (aka the Department of War) was allocated $816.7 billion dollars in our national budget, while failing to pass its sixth straight audit. U.S. war spending in 2023 dwarfs that of other countries, totaling more than the next 10 highest military budgets combined. Since October 7, the gunboat-diplomacy Biden administration has approved over 100 weapons sales to the government of Israel, an average of 1 every 36 hours.
I want my tax money to “beat swords into plowshares” by supplanting masculinist militarism with intelligent, committed, unrelenting diplomacy that lifts our country above our abject ranking as the 131st least peaceful country out of 163 countries on the Global Peace Index.
Our arduous path back from flawed to healthy democracy will only be through engaged citizens, activist organizations, and unions in cities and some states not shackled in the stranglehold of anti-abortion, anti-immigrant, Trumpian, and extreme religious right politics, nor held hostage by their weapons manufacturers.
- “Voters in California, Vermont, and Michigan in November 2023 adopted amendments to enshrine abortion protections into their respective state constitutions.” More states are expected to advance similar measures, because constitutional protections are considered the most ironclad and are very difficult to amend.
- In February 2024 the city of Flint, Michigan, recently approved a universal cash program for babies, called Rx Kids, that provides new mothers $1,500 and $500 monthly for their child’s first year.
- The same month, Detroit became the largest U.S. city so far to pass a “Move the Money” resolution, following the lead of neighboring city Hamtramck, Michigan. The measure, approved unanimously by the City Council, calls on the U.S. Congress and the president to shift public money away from the military to fund social services.
- In June 2023 the U.S. Conference of Mayors unanimously passed a resolution titled “Calling for Urgent Action to Avoid Nuclear War, Resolve the Ukraine Conflict, Lower Tensions with China, and Redirect Military Spending to Meet Human Needs.”
- In March 2024 the New York State Appellate Court ruled unanimously to affirm Kingston, New York’s Rent Guidelines Board mandating 15% rent reduction, given the scarcity of rental units and tenant organizing for housing justice.
- More than 100 US cities, including Chicago and Seattle, have passed resolutions on the genocidal Israel-Gaza war with most calling for a permanent cease-fire, exchange of Israeli hostages and Palestinian political prisoners, and free flow of aid to the Gazan people.
I want my taxes to be used for our true national security: lifting people out of poverty, hunger, and homelessness; providing universal healthcare; ensuring affordable housing for everyone needing it; assuring a livable wage; ending violence against women; affirming that Black Lives Matter; and fostering peace.
Keep ReadingShow Less
Tax Day and War Resistance, Philip Berrigan Style
As April 15 approaches, we can reflect on the life and work of Berrigan and undertake our own ministry of risk for peace—to ease the suffering, to restore human dignity, and to challenge our doomed policy of warmaking.
Apr 02, 2024
Each year Americans forfeit a sizable slice of their income to the United States Treasury to fund the government. Tax Day is dreaded. No one likes surrendering their hard-earned cash. But rather than a resigned shrug, Americans should look closely at what they are getting for their money when it comes to government services and policy.
In fiscal year 2023, the Pentagon received $858 billion for the preparation of war. This doesn’t include hidden costs for intelligence services, veterans’ benefits, Homeland Security, or the Department of Energy, which oversees the nation’s nuclear arsenal. All totaled, over $1 trillion a year is allotted for warmaking. By comparison, the 2023 budget for the U.S. Department of State, this nation’s department tasked with making peace across the globe, was a relatively miniscule $63 billion.
One way to register resistance to this profligate spending on warmaking is that of renowned peace activist and Catholic priest Philip Berrigan. During the Vietnam War, Phil initiated the destruction of U.S. military draft files in Baltimore and Catonsville, Maryland, to save the lives of both Vietnamese and Americans, actions for which he received lengthy prison sentences.
Whether it be gold, fruit, rubber, or sugar in Latin America; oil in the Middle East; or rare earth minerals in Africa, the U.S. taxpayer has long funded the corporate theft of natural resources from Indigenous lands for the benefit of U.S corporations and their wealthy shareholders.
These draft file actions by Phil initiated a new form of resistance to the Vietnam War, since no copies were kept of the draft files. Hundreds of similar actions followed at draft board offices across the country with hundreds of thousands of draft files destroyed, all stopping young men from being conscripted to kill or be killed.
In 1980, Phil initiated the Plowshares movement—which continues to this day—as he and others entered the General Electric nuclear weapons facility in King of Prussia, Pennsylvania, pouring blood on weapons blueprints and symbolically hammering on the nosecones of missiles, “Beating swords into plowshares.” A Christian metaphor indeed, but a universal message. Since that first action, there have been over 70 Plowshares actions around the world.
Phil strongly objected to the notion that U.S. citizens should fund needless death and destruction abroad through their taxes, or possibly fund their own destruction by nuclear war. He repeated nonviolent actions time and again, serving a total of 11 years in prison to stop the slaughter of innocents and protest the use of U.S. tax dollars for arms proliferation, nuclear warmaking, and endless wars of choice.
For U.S. citizens, the well-known waste and fraud of the Pentagon should be one outrage. The Pentagon remains the only federal department to never pass a required federal audit. The Pentagon cannot account for 63% of the tax money it receives. That’s our money. Gone. Unaccounted for. Lining the pockets of weapons manufacturers.
But the more pressing concern with these war dollars is their use to initiate wars of choice, often against impoverished countries, because those countries have natural resources beneath the soil that the U.S seems to think belong to them. The cruel joke is, “How dare they put their country over our oil.” And so, we take it. With extreme violence and death.
The U.S. currently has soldiers in northern Syria where massive quantities of oil is extracted for Western fossil fuel companies. The war in Iraq was for oil. We are building new bases in Somalia where oil fields have been found. These wars for corporate profit have gone on for over a century. As decorated war hero Smedley Butler said in the 1930s about his many years in the U.S. military, “I was a racketeer, a gangster for capitalism... Looking back on it, I might have given Al Capone a few hints.”
Whether it be gold, fruit, rubber, or sugar in Latin America; oil in the Middle East; or rare earth minerals in Africa, the U.S. taxpayer has long funded the corporate theft of natural resources from Indigenous lands for the benefit of U.S corporations and their wealthy shareholders. Innocents in foreign lands die as a result, while U.S. taxpayers struggle to pay mortgages, rent, healthcare bills, and food costs.
According to Brown University’s Costs of War Project, the United States spent some $8 trillion in the last 23 years for the Wars on Terror. Four-and-a-half to 4.7 million people in foreign lands died because of those wars, most of them innocent civilians. Mothers and fathers and children.
And so, as this Tax Day approaches, perhaps we can reflect on the life and work of Philip Berrigan and undertake our own ministry of risk for peace in whatever form that may take, to ease the suffering, to restore human dignity, to challenge our doomed policy of warmaking. Only in this way can we reconcile ourselves with justice and democracy. Only in this way can we save ourselves, our country, and perhaps the world.
As Phil said, “These blind leading the blind have done more than threaten us with doomsday scenarios. They have, with a devilish ingenuity, convinced us that we ought to pay, through taxes, for our own destruction.”
Keep ReadingShow Less
See More
Most Popular
To inform. To inspire. To ignite change for the common good.
News & Opinion
Trending
Common Dreams, Inc. Founded 1997. Registered 501(c3) Non-Profit
Privacy Policy