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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“Lying.” “Disgusting.” “Scum.” “Slime.” “Corrupt.” “Enemy of the people.” Donald Trump has always made clear what he thinks of journalists. And it’s plain now that his administration intends to do everything it can to stop journalists from reporting things it doesn’t like—which is most things that are true.

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