December 13, 2017

Provisions That Bleed Grad Students and the Sick Are Struck From Final Tax Bill

Daren Fentiman via ZUMA

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According to the Wall Street Journal, the following items have been left out of the final version of the Republican tax bill:

  • Repeal of the deduction for large medical expenses.
  • Repeal of the tax-free status of graduate-school tuition waivers
  • Repeal of the student-loan interest deduction
  • Repeal of private activity bonds

The first provision allows people to deduct medical expenses that are greater than 10 percent of their income. The second provision applies to grad students, who aren’t required to pay taxes on the “income” from waived tuition fees. Both benefits will now remain instead of being killed off.

As far as I know, none of these four ever amounted to much money, so ditching their repeal won’t affect the overall score of the bill. This makes you wonder why they were included in the first place, of course, but for now I guess we can just breathe a sigh of relief that they’re gone.

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We just wrapped up a shorter-than-normal, urgent-as-ever fundraising drive and we came up about $45,000 short of our $300,000 goal.

That means we're going to have upwards of $350,000, maybe more, to raise in online donations between now and June 30, when our fiscal year ends and we have to get to break-even. And even though there's zero cushion to miss the mark, we won't be all that in your face about our fundraising again until June.

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