Media Hit

Congress has voted to permanently bar state and local governments from taxing access to the Internet. For 17 years, the ban on Internet taxes has benefited millions of Americans by empowering them to conduct transactions on the Internet free from the fear of additional tax burdens. "This is a tremendous victory for America's Internet economy, and for all of us who participate in this economy", said Institute for Policy Innovation president Tom Giovanetti.

Passage of PITFA as part of HR-644 now "intensifies" S-698 opponents' push to "stave off the attempt" to pass that bill, said IPI president Tom Giovanetti in a statement. S-698 "has never had committee scrutiny on the Senate side and [has] never been subject to amendment on the floor." Senate Republican leaders "must commit to first submitting this legislation to the same procedures, hearings and scrutiny appropriate to any and all legislation, especially since this proposal has serious Constitutional questions," Giovanetti said.

Fans of the just-passed permanent Internet Tax Fairness Act (PITFA), which bans taxes on Internet servcie, were weighing in Thursday (Feb. 11), including warning about the Internet sale tax legislation whose future consideration was a tradeoff for that passage.

IPI's Dr. Merrill Matthews says repealing the mandate would be good for the economy and the environment. “Ending the Renewable Fuel Standard would immediately and dramatically increase the demand for oil, stabilize energy markets, boost the economy, and likely reduce carbon-dioxide emissions.”

Tom Giovanetti, president of the freedom-oriented IPI, recently wrote “Now that Texas Republican Kevin Brady chairs the Ways & Means Committee, he will have more to say about the details of any eventual tax reform than will the future president. So what really matters is Brady’s priorities…and they are encouraging”.

"If either [Trump or Cruz] wins the White House, it’s the EPA's, not the human race's, existence that will be threatened,” IPI's Merrill Matthews said.

Our success in effectively treating cancer is probably going to come from the private sector not the government, Dr. Merrill Matthews reminds us.

“The better hope for ending the federal power grab may come from the states, which have found lots of new reasons to embrace the Constitution’s federalism and challenge federal overreach,” said IPI's Merrill Matthews.

Bartlett Cleland of the Institute for Policy Innovation writes: The VAT is attractive to those who…[w]ant to grow government… Whether or not those proposing such taxes are interested in expanding the scope of government is almost irrelevant, because once the tools for such expansion are in place they can be used by future politicians to grow government subtly.  Similarly, whether a tax is labeled as a VAT or not is also irrelevant if the function is the same—for example by not allowing companies to deduct wages.

The Renewable Fuel Standard has been a boon to corn growers but hardly anyone else, writes Merrill Matthews, a resident scholar with the Institute for Policy Innovation in Dallas.