Focus Point – The Wrong Way to Fix Taxes
Some democrats want to cut the social security payroll tax in lieu of income tax rate reduction.
Medicaid Waivers: Wrong Cure for High Drug Prices
The Health Care Financing Administration (the agency that runs Medicare and Medicaid) can waive some federal requirements for Medicaid eligibility to allow states to experiment with new ways of delivering health care to the poor. Near the end of the Clinton administration, HCFA granted waivers to Maine and Vermont for programs allowing many people ineligible for Medicaid to get Medicaid prescription drug coverage.
Focus Point – Dynamic Scoring
The Bush tax cut is center stage, so this week let's look at it from some different perspectives.
If You Like Complicated Hidden Taxes, You'll Love Phase-outs
The Tax Code is littered with rules that phase out various deductions, exemptions and credits as taxpayers' incomes rise. These rules create hidden increases in marginal tax rates for unsuspecting citizens and greatly complicate tax calculations. Some of the items that taxpayers lose with higher incomes are deductible individual retirement accounts, Roth IRAs, the earned income tax credit (EITC), the exclusion of Social Security benefits from taxable income, the child credit, education credits and deductions, a portion of itemized deductions, even the personal exemption.
How Should Texas Grow?
According to the U.S. Census Bureau, Texas is expected to grow by more than 7 million people by the year 2025-the second largest increase in the nation.
Focus Point – The Phony fear of gun shows
One of the anti-gun forces favorite straw men is gun shows. Handgun control, Inc. claims 70 percent of the guns used in crimes come from gun shows. But as the NCPA's Sterling Burnett demonstrates, that's nonsense.
Focus Point – Who's Rich?
One of the less truthful gimmicks tax cut opponents like to pull is to deride them as gifts to "the rich." Setting aside the fact that the rich pay most of the taxes, and that a cut is economically and morally sound, who exactly are "the rich"?
Bipartisan Health Reform Brewing
There is growing consensus that the federal government should offer some sort of tax credit for the purchase of health insurance – an idea that could go along way towards reducing the number of uninsured from its current high of over 44 million. In other words: health reform is tax reform.
Bush's Social Security Commission Needs To Find Answers, Not Just Debate Problems
President Bush's promise to form a Presidential Social Security Commission next spring indicates that he is ready to reform Social Security.
Bush Tax Cut Affordable, Trigger Not Workable
The following is the testimony given today by Bruce Bartlett, senior fellow at the National Center for Policy Analysis before the House Budget Committee hearings on the economic impact of President Bush's tax cut and budget priorities.
Statement on the budgetary implications of President George W. Bush's proposed tax cut
Mr. Chairman, there are three major points I would like to make this morning regarding the budgetary implications of President George W. Bush's proposed tax cut.
Focus Point – Two O'clock Eastern War Time
If you're listening, you like radio. And if you like radio, have I got a read for you. It's called Two O'clock Eastern War Time, a novel by John Dunning about the excitement of wartime radio set at a station on the coast of New Jersey in 1942.
Dead-Horse Democrats
Big-spending liberals got their clocks cleaned by the Reagan tax cuts of 1981, and they're still incensed. So they are at it again, spurring on the dead horse of tax-cut opposition.
Bipartisan Consensus Builds For Health Care Tax Credits
A bipartisan group of Hill leaders joined economists from the Dallas-based National Center for Policy Analysis (NCPA) and the American Medical Association (AMA) to discuss the growing consensus for creating a tax credit to help the millions of uninsured Americans purchase private health insurance.
Bush Tax Cut Won't Cost As Much As Predicted
President Bush's proposed tax cut will not cost as much as is predicted because the published estimates do not take into account the rate cut's macroeconomic impact of increased growth.
Focus Point – Reagan in his own hand
I had a few days in the sun last week and a chance to catch up on some of my reading. Today, Reagan in his own hand; Tomorrow Two O'clock Eastern War Time.
Focus Point – Bush Speech
Liberals had a bad two days last week.
Why Are So Many Texans Uninsured?
One in four Texans does not have health insurance, the highest percentage in the nation. One reason is that a lot of families cannot afford health insurance. But many Texas families who can afford it simply choose not to buy it. As a result, many Texans are uninsured by choice.
NCPA & AMA Host Briefing On Tax Credits, A Bipartisan Approach To Expanding Health Care Coverage
A bipartisan consensus is beginning to form between President Bush and both Republicans and Democrats in Congress over enacting tax credits to expand health care coverage to the over 43 million uninsured.
Focus Point – The Law of Unintended Consequences
The law of unintended consequences is ready for work.
The Second Act: Social Security Reform
On Tuesday evening, President George W. Bush addressed a joint session of Congress in what amounts to his first State of the Union address. The most noteworthy point, however, came when President Bush discussed another one of his central campaign issues, one that may go further in defining his legacy than any other – Social Security reform.
Focus Point – Regulations Versus Business
We normally think of the regulatory burden as something imposed by Washington. But a new study by the Reason Public Policy Foundation, the NCPA and others shows big cities are perfectly capable of putting up regulatory barriers – and hurting the people who need help most: Minorities, new immigrants and single parents.
NCPA's Bruce Bartlett on Fox News Channel's "The O'Reilly Factor"
Bruce Bartlett, senior fellow with the National Center for Policy Analysis is scheduled to appear tonight on The O'Reilly Factor to discuss this week's decision by Federal Reserve Board Chairman Alan Greenspan to leave interest rates alone for the time being, and President Bush's continuing campaign for his tax cut package.