FISCAL BLOG

In the coming years, it will be important for policymakers to look for ways to ensure that life-saving and life-improving medications are affordable and available for Americans, and at the same time, ease pressure on our unsustainable fiscal outlook.

The benefits from tax breaks do not flow equally to households of different income levels.

In an important acknowledgement of our nation’s unsustainable fiscal outlook, the President’s budget for fiscal year 2023 proposes to reduce deficits by $1 trillion over the next decade relative to current law.

The statutory tax rate is the percentage imposed by law. The effective tax rate is the percentage of income actually paid.

Today, the Federal Reserve announced an increase in the target for the federal funds rate, the interest rate at which commercial banks lend to each other overnight.

The federal government has enacted legislation to provide relief from the COVID-19 pandemic, and the Treasury has ramped up borrowing to pay for it.

Currently, more Americans owe a greater average amount of student debt than at any time in U.S. history.

Unemployment Insurance can be a critical government tool to ease suffering from economic downturns and hasten a recovery.

The American Rescue Plan included a one-year expansion of the Child Tax Credit (CTC) and the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC). Both programs have proven to be popular and effective in reducing child poverty.

Our high and rising debt is “a big burden placed on current citizens, based on our past budgetary irresponsibility,” said Michael Peterson, CEO of the Peter G. Peterson Foundation, in a recent appearance on C-SPAN’s Washington Journal.