Event Coverage: Options for Tax Reform
Friday, March 24, 2006
The Center for American Progress was pleased to host a full-day conference with academic and policy experts from around the country who highlighted options for reforming the tax code. Many experts agree that the tax code is in need of repair. Yet it has been 20 years since the landmark 1986 reform. Given the growing complexity of the tax code, increased revenue pressures, and a changing economy; tax reform will likely be a central issue for 2006 and beyond. The conference provided a forum for sharing proposals–both quick fixes and broad overhaul–and for open and engaged discussion.
Event Video
Welcome & Opening Remarks
Panel I: Comprehensive Reform
Panel II: Education and Marriage
Luncheon Panel: Future of Tax Reform – Overhaul or Incremental Change?
Panel III: Rewarding and Encouraging Work, Supporting Parents, International Taxation
Note: All video provided in QuickTime (MPEG-4) format.
Conference Materials
- Options for Tax Reform – Individual conference papers
- Options for Tax Reform - full report (PDF)
- Panelists’ Biographies
- Tax Reform is Dead… Long Live Tax Reform! (PDF), by John Irons, in Tax Notes, March 23, 2006
- Principles and Proposals for Progressive Tax Reform (PDF)
- Fair, progressive tax reform would be good policy, good politics, by John Irons and Robert Gordon, Baltimore Sun, March 23, 2006.
- Simplify and Focus the Education Tax Incentives (PDF), by Susan Dynarski and Judith Scott-Clayton, in Tax Notes, June 12, 2006
- Tax Reform and Poverty (PDF), by Jason Furman, in Tax Notes, June 12, 2006
- Removing Tax Subsidies for Foreign Investments (PDF), by James Kvaal, in Tax Notes, June 12, 2006
- Child-Rearing and the Code: A Proposal for Caretaker Accounts (PDF), by Anne L. Alstott, in Tax Notes , June 12, 2006
Slide Presentations
Event Transcripts:
Conference Schedule
Introduction and Welcoming Remarks
Time: 9:00 A.M.
John Irons, Director of Tax and Budget Policy, Center for American Progress
Panel I: Comprehensive Reform
Time: 9:05 A.M.- 10:45 A.M.
The Honorable Chaka Fattah, U.S. Representative, Second Congressional District, Pennsylvania
John Irons, Director of Tax and Budget Policy, Center for American Progress
Maya MacGuineas, Director, Fiscal Policy Program, The New America Foundation
Van Doorn Oooms, Senior Fellow, Committee for Economic Development
Paul Weinstein Jr., Chief Operating Officer, Progressive Policy Institute
Discussants:
William Gale, Arjay and Frances Fearing Miller Chair in Federal Economic Policy and Deputy Director of the Economic Studies Program, Brookings Institution
Panel II: Education and Marriage
Time: 10:45 A.M. – 11:45 A.M.
Susan M. Dynarski, Associate Professor of Public Policy, Harvard University and Faculty Research Fellow, NBER
Jeffrey Liebman, Professor of Public Policy, Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government
Discussants:
Alan J. Auerbach, Director, Robert D. Burch Center for Tax Policy and Public Finance, University of California, Berkeley
[Unable to attend] Austan Goolsbee, Robert P. Gwinn Professor of Economics, University of Chicago, Graduate School of Business
Michael Dannenberg, Director, Education Policy Program, New America Foundation
Luncheon Panel: Future of Tax Reform – Overhaul or Incremental Change?
Time: 12:00 P.M.- 1:45 P.M.
Elizabeth Garrett, Vice Provost of Academic Affairs, University of Southern California and Member, President Bush’s Advisory Panel on Federal Tax Reform
Peter R. Orszag, Senior Fellow, Brookings Institution
Gene B. Sperling, Senior Fellow, Center for American Progress
Jon Talisman, Founding Partner of Capitol Tax Partners
Moderated by:
John Podesta, President and Chief Executive Officer, Center for American Progress
Panel III: Rewarding and Encouraging Work, Supporting Parents, International Taxation
Time: 1:45 P.M. – 3:15 P.M.
Anne Alstott, Jacquin D. Bierman Professor of Taxation, Yale Law School
Jason Furman, Senior Fellow, Center on Budget and Policy Priorities and Visiting Scholar at New York University’s Wagner School
James Kvaal, Harvard University
Discussants:
Jonathan Gruber, Professor of Economics, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Daniel Halperin, Stanley S. Surrey Professor, Harvard Law School
Robert Gordon, Senior Vice President for Economic Policy, Center for American Progress
Closing Comments
Time: 3:15 P.M. – 3:20 P.M.