The financial news that actually matters
Australia’s government wants to hit Meta, Google, and TikTok with a 2.25% charge on their Australian revenue if they refuse to pay local news publishers for content. Draft legislation for what Canberra calls the News Bargaining Incentive was released for public consultation in late April 2026, presenting the platforms with a stark choice: negotiate commercial…
For years, for-profit developers in North Carolina have avoided property taxes on affordable housing projects by partnering, sometimes in name only, with nonprofit organizations. A state House committee now wants to shut that door. The House Select Committee on Property Tax Reduction and Reform advanced “Legislative Proposal #4: Affordable Housing Exemption Modifications” at its April…
Roughly one in seven importers who applied for tariff refunds through the federal government’s new online portal have been turned down, raising early questions about a system that was built to streamline billions of dollars in disputed trade duties. U.S. Customs and Border Protection has denied 15% of refund entries submitted through its Centralized Automated…
When a corporate landlord sells a single-family rental in California and immediately buys another, it can defer every dollar of state capital gains tax. A first-time buyer competing for that same house gets no such advantage. A bill that would have changed that dynamic for the state’s largest investors is now dead for the session….
Nearly one in three North Carolinians depends on Medicaid for basic health care. The program that covers them is now at the center of a high-stakes standoff in Raleigh, where lawmakers have approved $319 million to keep it solvent but attached new eligibility verification requirements that could reshape who qualifies for coverage. House Bill 696,…
Three academic papers published in the Institute for Fiscal Studies’ journal Fiscal Studies have delivered the most detailed critique yet of annual wealth taxation in the UK, warning that a levy like the one proposed by the Green Party of England and Wales would likely drive capital offshore, stall investment, and cost more to enforce…
A carton of eggs at your local grocery store might cost you more than it costs your neighbor, and you would never know it. That is the scenario New Jersey lawmakers are trying to prevent with Senate Bill 3732, introduced in the state legislature in April 2026. The bill would outlaw the use of algorithms…
The federal government owes importers roughly $166 billion. Consumers who spent the past year paying inflated prices on electronics, clothing, shoes, and auto parts will almost certainly never see a dime of it. That is the practical fallout of a landmark ruling by the U.S. Court of International Trade, which found that President Trump’s “Liberation…
Jessica Tarlov spent weeks as the loudest voice in a growing tax revolt against the Trump administration, pledging on camera and across social media that she would refuse to send the IRS a single dollar of what she owed. Then, according to her own account, she filed her 2025 federal income tax return before the…
The federal government is processing an estimated $175 billion in tariff refunds this spring, and every dollar is flowing to the companies that paid duties at the border. Not a cent is going to the families who spent more on groceries, car seats, power tools, and electronics for years because of those same tariffs. Under…