The Hidden Welfare State : Tax Expenditures and Social Policy in the United States / Christopher Howard.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Howard, Christopher, author.

Series:

Princeton Studies in American Politics: Historical, International, and Comparative Perspectives

Princeton Studies in American Politics: Historical, International, and Comparative Perspectives ; 61

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Tax expenditures.

Taxation.

United States.

Political science.

Finance, Public.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (267 p.)

Edition:

Course Book

Place of Publication:

Princeton, NJ : Princeton University Press, [1999]

Language Note:

English

Summary:

Despite costing hundreds of billions of dollars and subsidizing everything from homeownership and child care to health insurance, tax expenditures (commonly known as tax loopholes) have received little attention from those who study American government. This oversight has contributed to an incomplete and misleading portrait of U.S. social policy. Here Christopher Howard analyzes the "hidden" welfare state created by such programs as tax deductions for home mortgage interest and employer-provided retirement pensions, the Earned Income Tax Credit, and the Targeted Jobs Tax Credit. Basing his work on the histories of these four tax expenditures, Howard highlights the distinctive characteristics of all such policies. Tax expenditures are created more routinely and quietly than traditional social programs, for instance, and over time generate unusual coalitions of support. They expand and contract without deliberate changes to individual programs. Howard helps the reader to appreciate the historic links between the hidden welfare state and U.S. tax policy, which accentuate the importance of Congress and political parties. He also focuses on the reasons why individuals, businesses, and public officials support tax expenditures. The Hidden Welfare State will appeal to anyone interested in the origins, development, and structure of the American welfare state. Students of public finance will gain new insights into the politics of taxation. And as policymakers increasingly promote tax expenditures to address social problems, the book offers some sobering lessons about how such programs work.

Contents:

Front matter

Contents

Tables

Acknowledgments

Abbreviations

Part One. Overview

Introduction

Chapter 1. Sizing Up the Hidden Welfare State

Part two: Origins

Chapter 2. Home Mortgage Interest and Employer Pensions

Chapter 3. Earned Income Tax Credit

Chapter 4. Targeted Jobs Tax Credit

Part three. Development

Chapter 5. Home Mortgage Interest

Chapter 6. Employer Pensions

Chapter 7. Earned Income Tax Credit

Chapter 8. Targeted Jobs Tax Credit

Part four: Conclusion

Chapter 9. Politics of the Hidden Welfare State

Appendix: List of Interviews

Appendix: Notes

Appendix: Index

Notes:

Description based upon print version of record.

Description based on online resource; title from PDF title page (publisher's Web site, viewed 08. Jul 2019)

ISBN:

9786612738357

9781282738355

1282738356

9781400822416

1400822416

OCLC:

709551178