taxes

The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) changes more than 60 tax rules every year to account for inflation. This stops something called "bracket creep." People move into higher tax brackets or lose value from credits and benefits when inflation rises instead of their real income rising. This is called "bracket creep."

Early property taxes were generally paid by farmers and were imposed mostly on land throughout the medieval era. These days, property taxes are also imposed on assets such as real estate, and they are paid periodically by individuals or organizations.

As the race for president in 2024 gets under way, candidates are starting to make plans for how they would handle taxes. Getting the government corporate tax rate down from 21% to 15% is a tax plan that both former President Donald Trump and former Vice President Mike Pence supported.

For many years, the European Union (EU) has been trying to make a single business tax base. The European Commission's recent 'Business in Europe: Framework for Income Taxation' (BEFIT) proposal and two related proposals on transfer pricing are the next steps in its legislative efforts to make the CCTB (common corporate tax base) and CCCTB (common consolidated corporate tax base) proposals law.

This week, we released our yearly State Business Tax Climate Index, which looks at how taxes are set up. Readers can compare state tax systems across more than 120 factors, making it a very useful diagnostic tool.

Prices that are marked up by a certain amount may not be taxed, but buyers still feel like they are. A clause added at the last minute to Pennsylvania bill HB 1300 would raise the minimum markup on cigarettes sold in the state.

Some states also have their own estate taxes or transfer taxes on top of the federal estate tax, which has a top rate of 40%. There are estate taxes in 12 states and the District of Columbia, and transfer taxes in 6 states. Maryland is the only state that has both a succession tax and an estate tax.

A number of nations have implemented carbon taxes, emissions trading schemes (ETSs), and environmental restrictions in an effort to cut carbon emissions.

In the European Union (EU), taxes dominate the tobacco market. According to the EU Tobacco duty Directive, Member States must collect a minimum excise duty on cigarettes and other tobacco products. Cigarette taxes in the EU include both a fixed euro amount per pack of cigarettes and an ad valorem tax (an additional percentage of the retail selling price).

Many Americans notice fuel taxes during the hot summer driving season. This map shows how much each state will charge for gas in July 2023.