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During the Overtime segment of Friday’s broadcast of “Real Time,” host Bill Maher said that some of the increased funding for the IRS in the Inflation Reduction Act will be used to audit middle-class taxpayers. While discussing Washington Post columnist, CNN Contributor, and “PBS NewsHour” Special Correspondent Catherine Rampell’s recent tour of an IRS facility and the problems the agency has with processing tax returns due to outdated technology, Maher said, “This bill that Biden signed this week has $80 billion…that’s what it’s for, right? It’s $80 billion to the IRS. Now, of course, the Republicans are saying, you’re going...

Republicans are coming under fire for their rhetoric over $80 billion in funding for the IRS included a massive climate, tax and health care bill that Democrats in Congress are sending to the White House. The funding, over 10 years, is intended to help the IRS enforce various provisions in the Inflation Reduction Act, which would raise more than $700 billion in new revenue by instituting a 15-percent corporate minimum tax, taxing stock buy backs and extending a cap on deductions for business losses, in addition to helping the IRS enforce existing tax law. Of the $80 billion, more than...

Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen penned a letter this week directing the Internal Revenue Service to ensure the $80 billion in additional funding it is set to receive over the next decade doesn’t result in more middle-class tax audits. Yellen sought to assuage concerns despite sharp criticism from Republican lawmakers and independent analyses which indicated the IRS spending spree included in President Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act will increase tax scrutiny for more than just wealthy Americans. “Specifically, I direct that any additional resources—including any new personnel or auditors that are hired—shall not be used to increase the share of small business...

The Inflation Reduction Act of 2022 appears to have a good shot at being signed into law. If Senate Democrats can get Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (D-AZ) to join Sen. Joe Manchin (D-WV), the bill will have the necessary 50 votes to pass through the reconciliation process. Let's hope that never happens. The plan would hurt working-class taxpayers and small-business owners across America. The act will introduce a "corporate alternative minimum tax," which will compel a 15% tax on corporate income. It will increase the taxes imposed on certain high-income earners. Finally, it will step up enforcement mechanisms within the IRS....

The reality of inflation and the specter of a recession appear to be weighing heavily on middle-class households. Among those whose income falls in the $30,000-to-$100,000 range, 75% say their earnings are falling behind the cost of living, and 77% think the U.S. will be in a recession by the end of 2022, according to a recent survey from Primerica. There’s also been a general uptick in financial worries in the last six months, with 39% of those surveyed expecting to be worse off financially in a year, up from 32% in March and 28% in December 2021. In December...

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Went from receiving over $4K in tax refunds to paying over $4k in one year. I knew I was going to take a hit, but didn't expect quite the doozy! What has been your experience this tax season?

Most of the time, the vast majority of Americans simply do not care about economics. And it pains me to say that, because I have been running a website about economics for more than a decade. But it is true. Under normal circumstances, most hard working Americans don’t have the time or the energy to debate the finer points of economic policy. But now things have changed. Here in 2022, our leaders have messed things up so badly that suddenly just about everyone is feeling the pain. Most people just want economic conditions to “return to normal”, but that isn’t...

The bottom never had much to lose but they managed to lose a bit anyway. The top keep padding their wealth but remain the most impacted by recessions. The middle class is shrinking. The poor who spend every penny and them some on food and shelter get hammered by inflation.

The snowball effect of cumulative inflation is going to be on display tomorrow when the BLS inflation data from December is released. We have previously discussed the unavoidable price increases as noted within the November data Here, and within the producer price data Here. While the data being released tomorrow is backward looking, we are in the eye of the inflation storm right now. The consumer prices at end of January and through February are all reflecting new purchase order prices and contract prices to wholesalers, buyers and retailers. As a result, the December reports will be the precursor to...

President Biden and congressional Democrats' Build Back Better (BBB) Act is now in the hands of the Senate. That legislative body's 50-50 partisan split will undoubtedly make the bill's passage difficult. In order for BBB to become law, Democratic Senate leadership will need to convince moderates such as Sens. Kyrsten Sinema (D-Ariz.) and Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) that the legislation's $2.4 trillion price tag can be offset by expanding the IRS and its enforcement efforts while imposing substantial tax reform measures. Congressional Democrats have argued that one of the best ways to pay for the legislation is to raise taxes on...

Monday on FNC’s “Tucker Carlson Tonight,” host Tucker Carlson decried the double standard policymakers have set for themselves and the ones for which they set policies, especially regarding the pandemic. While not adhering to the rules they have made for everyone else, Carlson declared the middle class has now become the “serf class.”

President Biden has promised not to raise taxes on anyone earning less than $400,000 but plans to end an inheritance loophole could do just that, according to a new analysis that suggests a widow with nothing to pass on to her children but her home could be badly hit by proposals that would leave the Bidens' personal fortune untouched. Tucked away in Biden's American Families Plan is a revision to the way capital gains taxes are paid on estates when people die. Critics have dubbed it a 'middle-class death tax' and say it will mean thousands of people having to...

I'm looking for definitive articles and op/eds that explains or defends the concept that Pres. Reagan authored the U.S.'s best economy in history -- just in time for Clinton's term of office.

The Wall Street Journal Editorial Board said it best: Biden's latest $1.8 trillion plan rejects the old social contract of work for benefits...So much for the “safety net” to prevent poverty.This is now about mainlining benefits to middle-class families so they become addicted to government - and to the Democratic Party that has become the promoting agent of government....All of this adds up to healthy guaranteed annual income largely untied to the social contract that requires work, which is the real path to independence and self-respect.The new taxes are destructive, but their impact will take time to be felt as...

Back in 2014, I wrote a book titled "The Murder of the Middle Class." Don't look now, but it's happening. Back then, I was referring only to the murder of middle-class jobs and the American Dream. Today, Democrats appear to want the middle class eliminated altogether. They're not just after our jobs; they're playing Russian roulette with our lives. I'm dead serious (excuse the pun). Biden -- or, more likely, the real decision-makers behind the man who resembles a braindead puppet -- really does appear to be carrying out the murder of the middle class. Let's start with COVID-19. If...

Great new song.

As the war on the rich continues to escalate on both coasts, it's the middle-class residents of blue states that will be stuck with the tab.The war on the rich is escalating on both coasts. While Democrats argue they’re righteously demanding the wealthy pay their fair share, it’s the middle class who will pay the biggest price. Legislation labeled a “wealth tax” targets the wealthy. In Washington state, billionaires would be hit with a 1 percent tax on intangible assets. New York’s legislation includes tax hikes on income, capital gains, inheritance, and even stock trades. Seattle state Rep. Noel Frame...

That's how Neofeudal systems collapse: the tax donkeys and debt-serfs finally rebel and start demanding the $50 trillion river of capital take a new course. The Great American Middle Class has stood meekly by while the New Nobility stripmined $50 trillion from the middle and working classes. As this RAND report documents, $50 trillion has been siphoned from labor and the lower 90% of the workforce to the New Nobility and their technocrat lackeys who own the vast majority of the capital: Trends in Income From 1975 to 2018. Why has the Great American Middle Class meekly accepted their new...

As Congress weighs to increase coronavirus stimulus checks to individuals from $600 to $2,000, former House Speaker Newt Gingrich on Tuesday joined President Donald Trump’s call to increase the payout in the coronavirus stimulus checks from $600 to $2,000. On FNC’s “Fox & Friends,” Gingrich acknowledged the importance of balancing the federal budget but said that middle-class Americans have been the “big losers” from the shutdowns put in place to help mitigate the spread of the coronavirus, particularly in Democratic states. He added that $2,000 checks would “help” the average American struggling from the “mess” created by some governments.