The debt ceiling is an arcane artifice without a real connection to the economy. But how well we invest in our families and workers directly relates to it.
Read more
Economic Justice
Combating inequality means both lifting up and building power at the bottom, and breaking up concentration of wealth and power at the top. That’s why we work at the intersection of economic and racial justice through projects designed to build leadership and self-empowerment of black workers, immigrant workers, and low-wage workers, youth and families affected by incarceration, along with projects aiming to reverse the rules that criminalize poor people of color, and projects fighting to ensure that the wealthy and Wall Street corporations pay their fair share of taxes.
Latest Work
Report: S&P 500 Executives Have Stashed Nearly $9 Billion in Special Tax-Deferred Compensation Plans Not Available to Ordinary Workers
At Walmart, Home Depot, and 20 other low-wage employers, executives have accumulated enough funds in these exclusive accounts to generate monthly retirement checks larger than their workers’ median annual pay.
Read more REPORT: A Tale of Two Retirements 2023
Our tax code helps CEOs retire in luxury while ordinary workers struggle. Here’s how to fix it.
Read more
The Human Cost of McCarthy’s Debt Ceiling Demands Would Be Catastrophic
McCarthy and his caucus are holding American families and the global economy hostage to his demands to slash vital social programs.
Read more
To Protect Our Children, Let’s Tax Our Rich
A century-old political lesson from the first grand champion of America’s kids.
Read more
The Trouble With Taiwan
Wherever one stands on the independence vs. accommodation spectrum in Taiwan, everyone should agree that a U.S.-China war is in nobody’s interest.
Read more
Private Jets Are Dirty Luxuries for the Ultra Rich. Let’s Tax Them.
The private jet industry is destroying the climate and intensifying inequality. Rather than providing subsidies, we should tax the hell out of it.
Read more
The Ultra-Wealthy Have a Private Jet Problem
This expensive, carbon-intensive form of travel is bad for both the earth and the taxpayers who subsidize it for the ultra-rich.
Read more
Right-Wing Judicial Activist Using Schwab Charity DAF to Move Funds
Secretive funding from ultra-wealthy donors has shaped the courts and public policy. Here’s how one donor-advised fund has facilitated that.
Read more
The U.S. Still Spends More on Its Military Than Over 144 Nations Combined
World military spending reached a new record high of $2.4 trillion in 2022, with the United States spending the most by far.
Read moreIPS Projects
Reports
REPORT: The Warfare State: How Funding for Militarism Compromises Our Welfare
Nearly two-thirds of the federal discretionary budget goes to militarized federal programs, leaving just over a third for our communities — a sliver some lawmakers want to cut even further.
REPORT: A Tale of Two Retirements 2023
Our tax code helps CEOs retire in luxury while ordinary workers struggle. Here’s how to fix it.
Report: High Flyers 2023: How Ultra-Rich Private Jet Travel Costs the Rest of Us and Burns Up the Planet
In this report, we assess the environmental, economic, and security risks of private jet travel — and lay out tax reforms to offset them.
Tax Day 2023: Where Your 2022 Tax Dollars Went
IPS’s National Priorities Project takes a look at where American taxpayers’ money went in 2022, and how skewed our national priorities are.
Wall Street Bonuses Decline But Still Dwarf Worker Pay Increases Since 2008 Crash
Since 2008, the average Wall Street bonus has climbed by more than 75 percent, compared to just a 54 percent increase in average earnings of all private sector workers and a 42 percent rise in manufacturing wages. If the minimum wage had increased as much as Wall Street bonuses since 1985, it would be worth $42.37 today.