Uncertain Fate: The Tax Relief for American Families and Workers Act
Will the $78 billion tax break bill for families and businesses die in the Senate? It’s on “life support,” reports NBC News. Top Senate Finance Committee Republican Sen. Mike Crapo (R-ID) remains unhappy with several provisions in the bill. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) told reporters, “The sponsors are trying to see if there are enough votes” to advance the bill on the floor. They’re not having much luck yet.
Next week in the Senate Finance Committee. On April 16, the Senate Finance Committee will hold a hearing on President Biden’s Fiscal Year 2025 IRS budget and the 2024 filing season. IRS Commissioner Danny Werfel will provide testimony.
USDOJ: Treasury can maintain higher cash balances before reinstatement of the statutory debt limit. A 2021 legal opinion by the US Department of Justice, posted late last week, gives Treasury leeway to maintain a cash balance that aligns or closely aligns with its assessment of the federal government’s financing needs. In the past, Treasury interpreted similar statutory language to effectively bar the holding of an excess cash buffer above normal operating balances in anticipation of the end of a debt limit suspension period.
Colorado bill would revive state child tax credit. The Democratic-sponsored proposal moving through the state House would establish a refundable Family Affordability Tax Credit, similar to the credit offered by Colorado in 2022. The credit would cost $700 million annually, funded with the state’s budget surplus. As a result, it would reduce any surplus funds available for tiered tax refunds stipulated by Colorado’s Taxpayer Bill of Rights.
Remembering Daniel Kahneman, the grandfather of behavioral economics. TPC’s Howard Gleckman reflects on the legacy and work of psychologist Daniel Kahneman, winner of the Nobel Prize in Economics in 2002. His work, begun with his colleague Amos Tversky, who passed away in 1996, upended the way we approach finance, economics, and taxation: People are not always rational, and we do not always operate in our own economic interest. Thanks to him, economic theory can operate closer to—even within—the real world. Kahneman passed away on March 27 at the age of 90.
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