Last week, more than 60 funders gathered in National Harbor, MD at the 2018 Prosperity Summit to talk through ways tax policies and related programs intersect with racial, gender, and immigrant justice. Through panel presentations by experts in the field and smaller strategy conversations amongst colleagues, important themes emerged around the need to work together to promote more equitable policies that help build prosperity for all.

Brett Grant of Voices for Racial Justice; Judy Darnell of United Ways of California; Taifa Smith Butler of the Georgia Budget and Policy Institute; and Heather McCulloch of Closing the Women's Wealth Gap at the 9/6 funder convening: Advancing Racial and Gender Equity Through the Tax Code: Tax Credits and Beyond.

There is urgency to this conversation. The tax code is one of the largest tools that the federal, state, and municipal governments have to provide families with economic security and wealth-building opportunities. Yet recent federal policy choices have further exacerbated inequities firmly entrenched in the tax code as Tax Reform 2.0 threatens to make permanent lower taxes for the wealthiest Americans.  In addition, the proposed public charge regulation,which includes the EITC in its expanded list of benefits considered when making immigration decisions, is still looming (read more about this proposed rule below). 

This meeting was the beginning of a conversation we would like to have with EITC Funders Network members about how to increase connections between equity and tax credit work. Please us this form to let us know  you'd like to be engaged in this conversation. And check out our new resource page on equity and the tax code , which includes a series of short video interviews with Chris Brown of PolicyLink, Erica Williams of the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, and Amy Matsui of the National Women's Law Center.