New Reports on Gender and Racial Bias in the Tax Code

From Francine Lipman:

National Women’s Law Center, in partnership with Groundwork Collaborative, the Roosevelt Institute, and the Georgetown Center on Poverty and Inequality, released three reports about gender and racial bias in the tax code and how to harness our tax laws as a tool for equity. You can access the final reports and executive summary here, and an article by Annie Lowrey at the Atlantic here

The Faulty Foundations of the Tax Code, co-authored with law professor Ariel Jurow Kleiman (University of San Diego School of Law), examines the outdated assumptions and gender and racial biases embedded in the U.S. tax code. It highlights tax code provisions that reflect and exacerbate gender disparities, with particular attention to those that disadvantage women with low incomes, women of color, members of the LGBTQ community, people with disabilities, and immigrants.

Reckoning With the Hidden Rules of Gender in the Tax Code, co-authored with the Roosevelt Institute, discusses how low taxes for the wealthy and corporations have played a role in enabling – and in some cases encouraging – those with the highest incomes and the most capital to accumulate outsized wealth and power in our economy. Centuries of discrimination and subjugation of women and people of color interact today with widening income inequality, such that white, non-Hispanic men are disproportionately represented among the wealthiest households, while labor and economic contributions from women of color are consistently undervalued. An agenda to advance racial and gender justice must reckon with provisions in our tax code perpetuate and enable these inequities.

A Tax Code for the Rest of Us: A Framework & Recommendations for Advancing Gender & Racial Equity Through Tax Credits, co-authored with the Georgetown Institute on Poverty and Inequality, examines how, while the U.S. income tax system is progressive overall, many aspects of the tax code reward wealth-building by the already wealthy and exclude low- and moderate-income families. Given the historical discrimination and ongoing structural barriers that have locked women and people of color out of economic opportunity, such tax provisions not only exacerbate economic inequality, but also amplify gender and racial disparities. This report considers the question: how can our tax code build on the success of the EITC and CTC to better dismantle structural barriers that impede economic security and wealth-building for women and people of color? It ultimately proposes a framework to help policymakers, advocates, and the public evaluate when and how refundable tax credits can advance equity, economic mobility, and opportunity for all.