For decades, the traditional gas tax has served as the financial backbone of American infrastructure, acting as a direct user fee intended to charge motorists precisely for the privilege of driving on government-maintained roads. However, a complex web of state excise taxes, local levies, and aggressive new environmental regulations has drastically altered the cost of…
WASHINGTON — In the complex machinery of the modern American economy, few components are as vital—or as volatile—as the borrowing costs of the United States government. As national debt continues to cast a long shadow over fiscal policy, shifting Treasury yields have once again seized the spotlight, revealing a delicate and often precarious relationship between…
BRUSSELS — As global economies grapple with the rapid digitalization of commerce, governments are scrambling to capture tax revenues from companies that operate across borders without a physical footprint. In Belgium, a major legislative push is underway to adapt the nation’s corporate income tax (CIT) framework to the realities of the modern digital economy. However,…
By Daniel Bunn President and CEO, Tax Foundation The global economic community recently lost a true visionary and pioneer of tax reform. Siim Kallas—the former Estonian Prime Minister, European Commissioner, and the intellectual architect behind the policies that catapulted Estonia’s economy into the modern era—passed away on August 22 at the age of 77. In…
WASHINGTON — As lawmakers grapple with looming insolvency deadlines and the structural fiscal imbalances facing America’s premier social safety net programs, the debate over entitlement reform has taken center stage in national economic policy discussions. Recently, The Washington Post editorial board published an opinion piece highlighting a striking figure: 37 percent of Social Security benefits…
By Tax Foundation Analysis Desk The debate over who ultimately bears the financial burden of international trade barriers has long divided economists, policymakers, and business leaders. Conventional economic modeling has frequently suggested that when the United States imposes tariffs on foreign goods, the domestic economy pays the overwhelming price—often calculated as a near-complete pass-through to…
WASHINGTON — As annual federal budget deficits approach an alarming $2urillion threshold, lawmakers in Washington are increasingly looking toward the federal tax code to generate revenue and stabilize the national debt. Amid this fiscal pressure, the Tax Foundation has released its flagship resource, Options for Reforming America’s Tax Code 3.0: A Policymaker’s Guide to Tax…
Main Facts A decade has passed since House Speaker Paul Ryan and Ways and Means Committee Chairman Kevin Brady unveiled the "Better Way" tax reform blueprint—a sweeping legislative framework that laid the intellectual and structural groundwork for the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA) of 2017. As the most comprehensive overhaul of the United States…
By Tax Policy Desk Analysis Published in collaboration with policy research updates Main Facts The landscape of state-level digital taxation is facing an existential crisis following a landmark court ruling in Maryland that struck down the nation’s first digital advertising tax. While Utah, Maryland, and Illinois share little in common regarding their geographic locations, political…
WASHINGTON — In recent months, financial news and economic commentary have rallied around a stark narrative: capital is gobbling up an ever-expanding slice of the American economic pie at the direct expense of workers. Driven largely by a widely cited series from the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), headlines have warned that the U.S. labor…
