FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: April 9, 2009

Boston–A new report from United for a Fair Economy (UFE) concludes that President Obama's tax proposals could be sharply improved to raise $300 billion more per year in revenue. The report also finds that improvements would make the taxes more progressive and reduce incentives for extreme financial risk-taking.

Designed to be accessible to average taxpayers, "Safe, Fair and Sustainable: Do President Obama's Tax Proposals Measure Up?" studies a selection of tax proposals contained in Obama's budget and rates them on key criteria.

"As Congress decides the specifics of tax plans that will impact whether and how we fund bold new initiatives for the country, taxpayers need to advocate for what they want," said Lee Farris, Federal Tax Policy Coordinator at UFE and co-author of the report. "The economic hardship facing ordinary Americans right now makes evaluating the impact of important tax policy choices all the more vital."

The report analyzes the proposals in President Obama's FY2010 budget that focus on high-income taxpayers and compares them to a set of tax proposals from the Institute for Policy Studies (IPS) in its report, "Reversing the Great Tax Shift: Seven Steps to Finance Our Economic Recovery Fairly."   UFE's report finds that with increased taxes on the wealthy, Obama's plan would be able to raise about $300 billion more per year.   It also finds that Obama's proposals could be more progressive, making taxpayers who have more wealth and income pay a higher rate.   Finally, UFE finds that Obama's proposal could do much more to reduce the tax incentives that led to the recent crisis on Wall Street.

The UFE report is available from UFE's website at http://files.faireconomy.org/reports/tax_day_2009.
The IPS report is available at http://www.ips-dc.org/reports/#1207.

United for a Fair Economy is a non-partisan organization that helps people of all races, ethnicities and classes work to reduce economic inequality.