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Memo to Governor Healey on Ways to Ensure Effective Implementation of the Fair Share Amendment
As Massachusetts voters have amended the state constitution to include a 4 percent surtax on taxable income over $1 million, MassBudget would like to offer policy suggestions to assist the Commonwealth in protecting this revenue and ensuring that it is directed to education and transportation, as specified in the amendment.
Letter to Governor-elect Healey and Lieutenant Governor-elect Driscoll on a Family Tax Credit
A letter to Governor-elect Healey and Lieutenant Governor-elect Driscoll on a consolidating different family tax supports into one simpler, fully refundable Family Tax Credit.
Massachusetts Capital Budget 101
The capital budgeting process takes place largely out of the public eye but is responsible for building and maintaining critical state infrastructure. Learn more about it here.
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Keeping Massachusetts Working for Workers: Policy Gains in 2018 and Possibilities Beyond
For Labor Day 2018, this brief looks at the gains Massachusetts workers made in 2018 — passing a $15 minimum wage, creating a paid family and medical leave program, and increasing the state's Earned Income Tax Credit to 30 percent of the federal credit — as well a handful of other options for making further improvements to the lives of workers and their families across the commonwealth.
Why the Count Counts: Major Sources of Federal Funding for Massachusetts Affected by Census Counts
The decennial Census counts for much more than a tally of every resident of the country. The Census is the country's snapshot: it creates our most accurate picture of everyone who lives here and where they live.
FAQ: The Massachusetts $15 Minimum Wage Proposal
This FAQ analyzes the minimum wage provisions of House Bill 4640. These provisions would increase the Massachusetts minimum wage from $11 an hour to $15 by 2023. The bill would also increase the minimum wage that employers are obligated to pay tipped workers from $3.75 to $6.75 by 2023.
Budget Monitor Conference Preview: Differences Between the Senate and House Budgets for FY 2019
The House and Senate Budgets reflect similar values: expanding access to education, helping working families to make ends meet (with an expansion of the Earned Income Tax Credit), and helping families to find housing. Both budgets are also constrained by limited revenue and are not able to make progress in a number of important areas including making higher education more affordable and significantly improving our transportation systems. The list below highlights several of the substantial differences between the House and Senate budgets, and the rest of this Monitor provides more detail on differences that the Legislature’s budget Conference Committee will have to reconcile.
Tending to the Nest Egg: Plan Could Help Nonprofit Workers Build Retirement Security
Many Massachusetts workers are unable to save enough money for themselves to retire on. This is partly because setting up and managing retirement plans is often too expensive for small and employers. In late 2017, Massachusetts launched a state-administered 401(k) plan that can begin to address some of these challenges. Small nonprofits, with 20 employees or fewer, can participate in the plan.
A Credit to Health: The Health Effects of the Earned Income Tax Credit
The opportunity to live a healthy life begins long before a person shows up at the doctor’s office or hospital; health begins where people live, learn, work, and play. There is growing recognition that greater attention to the social determinants of health – things like having stable housing, safe, walkable neighborhoods with accessible transportation, grocery stores with affordable, nutritious options, schools that are equipped to provide high-quality education, and incomes that enable families to make ends meet – is critical to making meaningful improvements to health. This paper briefly examines the health impact of one program that provides economic support for low-income working families: the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC).
Time to Care: The Health Effects of Paid Family & Medical Leave
In healthy communities, children are more likely to be born healthy and can grow up to be healthy adults. When people are healthy they are better able to reach their full potential and make lasting contributions to society. Health is influenced by a variety of complex factors, such as where one lives, access to healthy foods, and affordability of health care. Policies that address the ability of workers to care for family members, like Paid Family and Medical Leave (PFML), can also shape and influence health.
What Has Happened in Other States with High Tax Rates on Million-Dollar Incomes?
Massachusetts can have an economy that generates broad prosperity and home-grown millionaires with world-class education and infrastructure. Several other states have top income-tax rates as high, or substantially higher, than what is proposed in Massachusetts. Those states do not have fewer millionaires, and have not seen less growth in their share of millionaires over time.
