Ken Harney – Taking aim at the top tax bracket

 
From the April issue: Call it the third rail of the federal tax system: the politically untouchable cluster of special benefits and subsidies set aside exclusively for homeowners, including deductions for mortgage interest, local property taxes and capital gains exclusions on up to $500,000 in sale profits. Is the Obama administration serious about beginning to clamp limits on at least some of these subsidies? The administration isn’t commenting on anything beyond what was proposed in its first budget, submitted at the end of February, but housing and banking trade groups are worried that the initial proposal to cut back on the ability of upper-income families to write off mortgage interest and other expenses is just the opening move in a longer-range effort to reform the federal tax code.

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