The International Trade Commission's Assessment of the Trans-Pacific Partnership: Main Findings and Implications

In May of 2016 the United States International Trade Commission (ITC) issued its assessment of the impact of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP). This paper highlights the main findings of the ITC report and explains their derivation and implications. It also examines several issues that were explicitly excluded from analysis in the ITC report

A Voluntary Default Savings Plan: An Effective Supplement to Social Security

This paper outlines a proposal for a default savings plan that is intended to provide an important supplement to retirement income for the bottom half of the workforce, most of whom have little other than Social Security to support themselves in retirement at present. Under the proposal, workers would make a default contribution of 3.0 percent on annual wages up to $40,000. They could opt out from this contribution if they choose. The contribution would be automatically turned into an annuity at retirement although workers would have the option to make a lump sum withdrawal after paying a modest penalty.The lowest income workers would get a modest contribution paid into the system by the government based on their earnings. This payment would be modeled along the lines of the Earned Income Tax Credit, with the payment increasing with earnings up to$8,000 and then phasing down to zero with earnings above $20,000. There would also be a match of savings that phases down to zero at$40,000

The Housing Crash Recession and the Case for a Third Stimulus

This paper makes the case for a third stimulus package to in the face of economic indicators signaling that the economy is in a deeper downturn than was expected based on previous projections. Specifically, the report calls for an employer tax-credit for extending health care coverage and another per worker employer tax credit for increasing paid time off from work. The author also makes the case for a housing policy centered on the stabilization of prices in non-bubble and deflated markets rather than applying the same efforts on markets that remain at bubble inflated levels. Finally, the paper argues that the dollar must be allowed to fall in order to adjust trade imbalances that are compounding the U.S. economic crisis caused by the collapse of the housing market

The Economic Impact of the Iraq War and Higher Military Spending

In order to get an approximation of the economic impact of the increase in U.S. military spending associated with the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, CEPR commissioned the economic forecasting company Global Insight to run a simulation with its macroeconomic model. It produced a simulation of the impact of an increase in annual U.S. military spending equal to 1 percent of GDP, approximately the actual increase in spending compared with the pre-war budget. Global Insight's simulation shows higher military spending raises interest rates, which reduces net exports, housing construction and car sales, thereby slowing the economy and job creation

The Big Tax Increase Nobody Noticed

In January of 2013 nearly every worker in the country saw their payroll tax increase by 2.0 percentage points. The payroll tax holiday that had been put in place at the start of 2011 ended in December of 2012, leading to a jump in the Social Security tax from 10.4 percent to 12.4 percent of earnings up to the taxable limit.This was an extraordinarily large increase in the payroll tax. Past increases had generally been phased in gradually. For example, from 1980 to 1990 the tax rate was increased by a total of 2.24 percentage points; however in no year did the rate rise by more than 0.72 percentage points, just over one-third of the 2013 increase.3 If the public was strongly opposed to any tax increases, it would be expected that one as large as the 2013 rise in the Social Security tax would lead to considerable anger, especially given the weakness of the labor market which was still very much feeling the impact of the 2008-2009 recession at that point

The Origins and Severity of the Public Pension Crisis

There has been considerable attention given in recent months to the shortfalls faced by state and local pension funds. Using the current methodology of assessing pension obligations, the shortfalls sum to nearly $1 trillion. Some analysts have argued that by using what they consider to be a more accurate methodology, the shortfalls could be more than three times this size. Based on these projections, many political figures have argued the need to drastically reduce the generosity of public sector pensions, and possibly to default on pension obligations already incurred. This paper shows:Most of the pension shortfall using the current methodology is attributable to the plunge in the stock market in the years 2007-2009.The argument that pension funds should only assume a risk-free rate of return in assessing pension fund adequacy ignores the distinction between governmental units, which need be little concerned over the timing of market fluctuations, and individual investors, who must be very sensitive to market timing.The size of the projected state and local government shortfalls measured as a share of future gross state products appear manageable

Job Sharing: Tax Credits to Prevent Layoffs and Stimulate Employment

The unemployment rate is expected to average 10.2 percent for 2010, 9.1 percent for 2011, and 7.3 percent for 2012. With this in mind, this Issue Brief describes a job sharing tax credit, designed to provide a quick and substantial boost to the economy. It would use tax dollars to pay firms to shorten the typical workweek, while keeping pay constant. This should cause employers to want to hire additional workers. A rough estimate of the impact of this tax credit is between 1.3 and 2.7 million jobs created

Subprime Rescue Plans: Backdoor Bank Bailouts

This report analyzes recent proposals suggesting that the government buy up or guarantee bad mortgage debt in an attempt to slow the increasing number of foreclosures the nation has seen in the wake of the housing market's meltdown. The study, which focuses on the plan put forth by the Office Thrift Supervision, shows that banks and mortgage holders end up being the true beneficiaries of such plans at the expense of taxpayers and with few gains for the majority of homeowners currently facing foreclosure

Universal Voluntary Accounts: A Step Towards Fixing the Retirement System

Most older workers are ill-prepared for retirement, with few financial assets to rely upon other than Social Security. Less than 20 percent of the private sector workforce is currently covered by a defined benefit (DB) plan, and this number is declining rapidly. Defined-contribution (DC) plans, such as 401(k) accounts, have not come close to filling the gap. This paper outlines a proposal for a system of universal voluntary accounts (UVAs). UVAs would be state sponsored, but privately managed, defined-contribution accounts. The accounts would be open to every worker in a state

Has the Congressional Budget Office Joined the Push for Cutting Social Security?

Over the last three decades the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) has built up a reputation for solid impartial analysis of economic and policy issues. While the party controlling Congress gets to select the head of the agency, both parties have generally turned to the CBO's respected academics who did not attempt to use the agency to push a political agenda. Unfortunately, there is reason to question whether this is still the case. CBO changed its modeling of the impact of deficits and debt on the crowding out of private investment in its recently published 2010 long-term budget projections. As a result, the 2010 projections show that deficits in the near future will crowd out far more investment than the 2009 projections