The Knowlership Blog

Both houses of the Republican-controlled Congress passed sweeping tax reform legislation on December 20. Despite the GOP’s longstanding push to repeal of the alternative minimum tax (AMT), it remains in the tax code, albeit in a tamer form . By backing off its repeal efforts yet again, Congress missed an opportunity to restore some transparency to the tax code. Given the aura of elitism surrounding the original GOP tax reform measures, many observers assume that repealing or reducing the power of the AMT only benefits the privileged . Critics of the measure are right to consider it a tax on the rich, but its story is more complicated than that. Since its enactment, it has engulfed more and more taxpayers while most of the richest Americans remain unscathed. In 1969, Congress passed the alternative minimum tax in an attempt to target 155 wealthy individuals who were able to take advantage of so many deductions, credits, and other loopholes in the tax code that they did not pay...

Senator Bernie Sanders (I - Vermont) scheduled a visit to the University of Toronto in late October. On his agenda are visits to healthcare facilities and a convocation “to see what we can learn from the Canadian system,” Sanders says. Canada’s publicly funded and administered healthcare system has received much acclaim in the United States, with some associating the country with model health policy. If healthcare is a right, like Sanders suggests, then Canada’s free universal system seems ideal. Neglected in this enthusiasm are the hidden yet very concrete costs of wait times in Canadian healthcare. Sometimes we deceive ourselves into thinking something is free when we have actually paid for it. At many universities, for example, full-time students may enroll in a meal plan. When students pay for a meal plan, the school allots them a certain number of meals or credits that may be spent at certain campus locations, like the cafeteria, coffee shop, or spirit wear store. A...

“Don’t tax you, don’t tax me, tax that fellow behind the tree.” – Russell B. Long _____ Illinois finally passed a budget. Some may consider this a story of triumph and political cooperation, but the fact remains: Illinois is grossly in debt, and this gorilla in the room must be tackled sometime soon. Considering the new tax hike, expect the call for a progressive income tax to reenter Illinois’ legislative arena soon. Progressive income taxes are popular political proposals because they tax a person in a higher-income bracket at a higher rate than someone in a lower-income bracket, which contrasts with Illinois’ current flat-rate income tax system, which will now tax 4.95 percent of all earned income. On its face, this seems fair—the rich can afford to give up more of their income, can they not? But who is “rich?” Taxpayers never seem to ask this question. Americans are notoriously terrible estimators of their socioeconomic status. Survey results will vary somewhat, but a d...

A handful of words in the English language have the power to slam conversations to a screeching halt.  In most cases, these words gain their power from their ability to utterly dismiss the humanity, agency, or moral legitimacy of another person.  For many Americans, one of these words is "privilege." In our culture's ever-developing pursuit of social justice, "privileged" has become a go-to word for describing people or groups we deem insensitive to the plight of the marginalized.  "White privilege," for instance, references the fact that Caucasians are less likely to experience hindrances on their path toward social and material success, particularly in comparison to African-Americans and Latinos, and it also signals the fact that white Americans rarely have to deal with racialized treatment (whether benign, ignorant, or malicious). For example, if a white person is initially skeptical of whether shootings of unarmed black men are racially charged...

We Americans tend to measure our material success relatively, not absolutely.  In other words, we judge our personal success not just on  how much  influence, money, etc. we have, but how much we have compared to those around us,  ceteris paribus . There is a growing sense, particularly in the millennial generation, that it is simply unfair for so few people to own so much of the capital circulating the country.  Some are even calling for a total reformation of the market-based economy the United States is so well-known for because they feel it has failed all but a fortunate few (note the success of the Bernie Sanders campaign). Despite these sentiments, the current generation of Americans possesses far more than any generation previous.  More desirable  things  are more commonly available.  Consider spending patterns over the last hundred or so years.   First, food expenditures as a percentage of income have plummeted during the la...

Below is an essay responding to Clark Nardinelli's research on child labor during the Industrial Revolution. Although our impulsive response to such a system is one of disgust, such sentiments lack sympathy for nineteenth-century families and the choices they faced. Indeed, families viewed child labor with such favor that child labor laws could not be passed until 1) a regional economy no longer utilized child labor and 2) special interest groups such as unions joined forces with the relatively small romantic movement against child labor. Nardinelli's work reminds us to remember the importance of choices and how premature restriction of choice can harm families over the long-run. ______ Nearly eight decades after the passing of the Fair Labor Standards Act, public opinion sees child labor as a relic of an ignorant and archaic past. The prohibition of employing children under fourteen has been seen as a moral victory over abusive business practices proliferated in the late nine...