In Case You Missed It...

This week on Off the Charts, we focused on the federal budget and taxes, SNAP (formerly food stamps), health reform, the economy, and state budgets and taxes.

• On the federal budget and taxes, Kathy Ruffing warned that the House-passed “debt prioritization” measure is simply default by another name.  Chye-Ching Huang laid out key issues in reforming international tax rules and explained that a new study from Treasury Department analysts highlights the risks of corporate tax reform.  And, in advance of Mother’s Day, Arloc Sherman noted the benefits of the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) and Child Tax Credit (CTC) for mothers and children.

• On SNAP, a series of posts from Stacy Dean and Dottie Rosenbaum explained that the program helps vulnerable people, showed that it encourages and rewards work, and highlighted its strong record of efficiency.

• On health reform, we excerpted Paul Van de Water’s congressional testimony on the law’s tax on insurance providers.  Edwin Park explained why changes promoted by health reform opponents would undermine the law’s Medicaid expansion.  Jesse Cross-Call noted, in advance of Mother’s Day, that state policymakers could better support all women by taking advantage of the Medicaid expansion.

• On the economy, we highlighted a New York Times op-ed by Jared Bernstein on why full employment should be a central policy goal.  Chad Stone reflected on the relationship between U.S. debt and economic growth in light of errors found in the influential paper by economists Carmen Reinhart and Kenneth Rogoff.

• On state budgets and taxes, we highlighted a radio interview in which Michael Mazerov made the case for the Senate-passed bill requiring all large Internet retailers to charge any applicable sales taxes.

In other news, we released Paul Van de Water’s testimony on health reform’s insurance provider tax and a fact sheet on how many lower-income working mothers in each state receive the EITC and CTC.  We also updated our state-by-state fact sheets on who benefits from SNAP and updated our backgrounder on Medicaid.