Hang in there @romanigypsyeyes . Lots of folks are lobbying against this. Maybe you can write your representative.
mmm beer…
One part of the tax proposal I agree with. 
I called and wrote. I was told that it would be offset by the personal exemption bs. The interns answering the phones of course couldn’t say anything other their scripts.
Because I’m in a grossly gerrymandered district, my rep is a solid fall in line Republican. It used to be a toss up district.
Many state income tax forms state with federal AGI. So it would make sense if tuition waivers are included in federal income, they would be taxed at the state level. Some states may create adjustments to federal AGI which back out the waivers.
I called as well although it appears I’m in a reliably safe republican district. I’m still getting the lay of the land.
After this mess, I think I’ve lost all desire for party affiliation.
There doesn’t seem to be any reasonable group left. I guess that’s the reason for the growth of independents. :-@
I vote both ways I’m even a bit fiscally conservative, but this bill is a big turd. I have not figured out if my rep is a hard core republican or more like my old rep who was a reasonable republican.
Definitely a huge turd. I’m pretty shocked at how clueless the people are who put this together, and who are selling it. Do they really think they can sell this as a middle class tax cut? How stupid do they think we are?
Problem is, even if your rep is reasonable, these kind of things end up going on party lines. I recommend call and say NO! They may not listen to a word you say, but they get the jist of “no way”.
Yes I called the local number and the D.C. number. I just don’t get why they have to rush this through without proper debate.(actually I do get it). Seriously they could get real reform if they just slow down, have hearings and really see how this is affecting everyone. I know they are trying to pass this before the midterms for political reasons.
Pretty sure they are not clueless, since it is a bill meant to reward their donors, with some offsetting taxes targeted against those whom they do not like (e.g. universities and students). Of course, they threw in some temporary tax cuts for some middle class people to be able to sell it as such, hoping that voters will fall for it.
@busdriver11 yes they can and yes they will. They know from decades of experience that lying and gas lighting work.
Except it’s extraordinarily easy to see through. And as much as they love big donors, they only each get one vote. They still all want to get re-elected.
A lot of people probably have no idea what is in it. I mentioned it to someone today and they had no idea what was even in it. They are probably banking on the majority of people not reading past the “tax cut” headline.
When Nature and C&EN front pages feature tax reform articles instead of breaking science news… you know it is not going to be good for the innovation in the US.
So your representative has instructed his interns to lie to constituents, then?
@“Cardinal Fang” affirmative.
They lied to us too when I called about ACA repeal.
He isn’t running again so I think he just does not give a crap.
oped in today’s higher ed news.
Couple of things, which do not support the authors pov:
Sounds like a real job to me, which in the US should be taxable income.
One of the commenters mentioned that Ohio treats Grads students differently:
Anyone with a grad student at tOSU and can confirm?
OSU’s graduate page:
Associateships, awarded for teaching, research or administration, are the primary source of financial assistance provided to graduate students. Most graduate associateships provide a 12-month tuition waiver, a nine-month stipend and subsidize health insurance in exchange for 20 hours of work per week for nine months. Last year, Ohio State employed more than 4,500 graduate associateships, including Graduate Teaching Associates (GTAs), Graduate Research Associates (GRAs) and Graduate Administrative Associates (GAAs).
It is not a real job. It is graduate school. Taxing the tuition waivers would make it impossible for graduate schools to exist as we currently know them. No other country does this. Many of the immigrants who come here, get STEM PhDs and start silicon valley companies would have to go somewhere else because they couldn’t live on existing stipends. I’m telling you, that the dearth of US Citizen PhDs is really hurting US defense research. I’ve seen the dropoff over the last 10 years. It’s chilling. My company has many open reqs just waiting to find someone. That should be a bipartisan concern. Any kind of university research in the US is already under so much strain with too many chasing too few resources in terms of grants, that it couldn’t take this kind of hit without it fleeing elsewhere.
My tenured professor friends are still working 80 hours weeks to chase the ever dwindling grants. This would nail the coffin shut. Their grants can not take a 25% penalty which is the cost of increasing stipends back to the sustenance cost of living.
Taxing tuition waivers is really dumb policy because the students never see the cash that they are being taxed on. It’s not just a big hit to these graduate students, it makes it impossible to attend. Someone making $30K a year before tax now, cannot take a $8400 a year cash hit. My D1 was making $80K before she went to graduate school. She and everyone else like her would have to quit and get a job without the PhD.
How many classes to grad students or PhD students typically take?
I’m sure there would be ways to mitigate this, like characterizing it as a scholarship as mentioned above, or only taxing you for the classes you take (assuming you don’t take a full load).
That said, it is a dumb idea.