{"id":727,"date":"2008-10-22T10:04:28","date_gmt":"2008-10-22T15:04:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/masonvotes.gmu.edu\/blog\/?p=727"},"modified":"2008-10-28T15:42:21","modified_gmt":"2008-10-28T20:42:21","slug":"taking-the-cost-of-education-out-of-taxes-college-affordability-part-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/masonvotes.masonstudentmedia.com\/blog\/2008\/10\/22\/taking-the-cost-of-education-out-of-taxes-college-affordability-part-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Taking the Cost of Education out of Taxes – College Affordability Part 2"},"content":{"rendered":"

Tax credit programs allow those applicable for a credit to subtract the value from their annual tax payment, or claim it as a deduction. So if you were required to pay $5,000 in taxes this year and you received the $4,000 tax credit that Obama proposes for students, you would only have to pay $1,000 in taxes. Many politicians, including Obama, favor providing tax credits to college students in exchange for public service. However, some college administrators state <\/a> that tax credit programs force an increase in overall student tuition.<\/p>\n

Obama wants to increase tax credits, McCain states he wants to simplify them, but by simplify, does he mean eliminate? Find out in Part 2 of Mason Votes series on College Affordability.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Obama’s plan includes a fully refundable credit of $4,000, which he says will cover “two-thirds the cost of tuition at the average public college or university.” Students who take this credit will be required to conduct 100 hours of public service a year. For comparison, George Mason University’s in-state tuition in 2007-08 came to $6,840 while out-of-state tuition was $19,728.<\/p>\n

In 2009, legislation will raise Virginia’s minimum wage to $7.25. At that rate, it would take over 550 hours to earn the same amount as Obama’s $4,000 tax credit. Virginia’s average weekly wage in 2007 was $901 (that’s 10th highest in the US). If you were to work 40 hour weeks at this rate, that means around twice as many hours to earn that $4,000 then you would need doing public service under Obama’s plan.<\/p>\n

If you thought that was confusing, you’re not the only one. McCain says he seeks to simplify tax benefits.<\/p>\n

“I can ensure that a greater number of families have a lower tax burden when they are helping to send their children to college,” states McCain in his website’s higher education plan.<\/p>\n

By simplify, McCain may mean eliminate. He voted against tuition credit created to cover college costs and provide tax credit incentives for teachers in 2000 (RC #182). He also voted against the Hope Scholarship Credit, meant to decrease overall attendance costs for disadvantaged children, in 2001. In both 2001 and 1999, McCain voted against making college tuition a tax deductible expense.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Tax credit programs allow those applicable for a credit to subtract the value from their annual tax payment, or claim it as a deduction. So if you were required to pay $5,000 in taxes this year and you received the $4,000 tax credit that Obama proposes for students, you would only have to pay $1,000 […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[4,3,6],"tags":[172,81,174,165,138,171,173,175,176],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/masonvotes.masonstudentmedia.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/727"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/masonvotes.masonstudentmedia.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/masonvotes.masonstudentmedia.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/masonvotes.masonstudentmedia.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/masonvotes.masonstudentmedia.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=727"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/masonvotes.masonstudentmedia.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/727\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":780,"href":"https:\/\/masonvotes.masonstudentmedia.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/727\/revisions\/780"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/masonvotes.masonstudentmedia.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=727"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/masonvotes.masonstudentmedia.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=727"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/masonvotes.masonstudentmedia.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=727"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}