Letter: “Some lawmakers throw up their hands, but there’s much that can be done”

Enid Eckstein, “Some lawmakers throw up their hands, but there’s much that can be done,” Boston Globe, January 12, 2026.

Anjali Huynh rightly calls out Massachusetts Democrats for being less aggressive than lawmakers in other blue states in “building an anti-Trump wall,” but I disagree with the contention of some that there is only so much the Legislature can do. It can do plenty.

As legislators returned last week, they confronted a loss of $3.5 billion in annual federal aid, and more in lost tax revenue, due to the Trump administration’s federal tax changes. Many Massachusetts residents will be squeezed by rising health care costs, and tens of thousands risk losing health care coverage or Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program benefits.

Massachusetts can join neighboring states and pass a measure that would raise as much as $400 million in new annual revenue by fighting offshore tax dodging by large global companies such as Apple, Amazon, and Walmart.

The Legislature also can opt out of state-level adoption of the Trump corporate tax cuts and preserve more than $400 million in state revenue this year alone. Maine, Rhode Island, and other states have already done this.

Lawmakers also could use a reasonable amount of the $8.6 billion rainy day fund to fill the holes in key services without a long-term impact on the fund itself. The fund was created to act as a buffer for shortfalls during emergencies by preventing drastic cuts to health care, education, and public safety. This is an emergency.

Massachusetts legislators have many tools in their toolbox, and it is time to start using them.

Enid Eckstein

Jamaica Plain

The writer is on the steering committees of Jamaica Plain Progressives and Raise Up Massachusetts.

Letter: “Fear not, the millionaires tax is bearing fruit”

Jonathan Cohn, “Letter: It’s our high cost of living, not the tax, that’s driving people to leave the state,” Boston Globe, April 28, 2025.

Chris Anderson,president of the Massachusetts High Technology Council, and Jim Stergios, executive director of Pioneer Institute, cite U-Haul data to argue that residents of Massachusetts are fleeing the state’s new Fair Share millionaires tax (“The millionaires tax: A cautionary tale for R.I.,” Opinion, BostonGlobe.com, April 23). But are multimillionaires really the ones renting U-Hauls?

Massachusetts is experiencing outmigration, but it’s not multimillionaires who are fleeing slightly higher taxes. It’s young workers fleeing our high cost of living.

As a millennial, I’ve become accustomed to seeing friends move out of Boston, then out of the state entirely, due to the high cost of living. If you want to buy a home for a decent price or find affordable child care, good luck. We are losing people because affording the high quality of life we tout is getting farther and farther out of reach.

By supporting massive investments in education, from prekindergarten through college, and in transportation infrastructure that will enable new housing production across the state, Fair Share is addressing the real drivers of outmigration. New policies such as free school meals, free buses, and free community college are making the state more affordable for middle-class families.

I hope our neighbors in Rhode Island join us in building an economy that works for everyone, not just those at the top.

Jonathan Cohn

Policy director

Progressive Mass

Boston

Happy Tax Day! Time for Large Corporations to Pay Their Fair Share

Last week, Republicans in the US House voted to advance a budget outline that entails steep cuts to Medicaid, the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, and other essential programs in order to fund tax cuts for billionaires and large corporations.

Their priorities are clear. And so should ours in Massachusetts.

The federal budget fight isn’t over. But MA needs to ensure that, regardless of what Congressional Republicans do and regardless of Elon Musk’s illegal federal funding freezes, we are not cutting essential services. We need to do more to meet the needs of all, not less.

And we know how to raise such funds. It’s not by giving tax cuts to rich people and large corporations as our Legislature did two years ago. It’s by ensuring that large corporations are paying their fair share.

That’s why we’re supporting Raise Up Mass’s Corporate Fair Share campaign to ensure that billionaire global corporations like Apple, Google, and Walmart pay their fair share and can’t get away with tax-dodging antics.

Can you email your legislator in support of this important legislation?

Did you know that Massachusetts taxes a smaller share of offshored corporate income than New Hampshire? An Act Combating Offshore Tax Avoidance (H.3110 / S.2033) would fix that, bringing us in line with the federal government and other states and raising hundreds of millions of dollars in new annual revenues.

Email, Call, and then Show Up

Want to make sure that your legislators hear that message loud and clear?
Join us next month — on Wednesday, May 28, at 10 am at the State House — for our annual lobby day.

RSVP HERE

Extremist Republicans in Congress Just Voted to Cut Health Care to Fund Tax Cuts for the Rich. Here’s How to Push Back in MA.

Last night, Republicans in the US House voted to advance a budget outline that entails steep cuts to Medicaid, the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, and other essential programs in order to fund tax cuts for billionaires and large corporations.

Their priorities are clear. And so should ours in Massachusetts.

The federal budget fight isn’t over. Every Democrat present voted NO yesterday (that includes MA’s 9-member delegation), and there is still time to block harmful cuts. But MA needs to ensure that, regardless of what Congressional Republicans do and regardless of Elon Musk’s illegal federal funding freezes, we are not cutting essential services. We need to do more to meet the needs of all, not less.

Unfortunately, Governor Healey’s proposed budget would halve the number of mental health case workers, limiting access to essential care. Thankfully, she put a pause on her plans to close two of the state’s mental health hospitals, but more funding will be needed.

And we know how to raise such funds. It’s not by giving tax cuts to rich people and large corporations as our Legislature did two years ago. It’s by ensuring that large corporations are paying their fair share.

That’s why we’re supporting Raise Up Mass’s Corporate Fair Share campaign to ensure that billionaire global corporations like Apple, Google, and Walmart pay their fair share and can’t get away with tax-dodging antics.

Can you email your legislator in support of this important legislation?

Email Your State Legislators

Did you know that Massachusetts taxes a smaller share of offshored corporate income than New Hampshire? An Act Combating Offshore Tax Avoidance (HD.3390/SD.1684) would fix that, bringing us in line with the federal government and other states and raising hundreds of millions of dollars in new annual revenues.

MA needs to combat offshore tax dodging and make the world’s most profitable mega-corporations pay their fair share in state taxes, instead of cutting public services like healthcare and education that we all rely upon.

LTE: High rents have young people putting Boston in the rearview mirror

Jonathan Cohn, “High rents have young people putting Boston in the rearview mirror” (letter), Boston Globe, March 15, 2024.

Last year, the Greater Boston Chamber of Commerce said that Massachusetts needed to cut taxes on businesses and the rich because otherwise people would flee the state. They won a generous tax package, but cutting the tax on the estates of multimillionaires and the tax on day traders and speculators won’t change the minds of young people about where to live.

Indeed, the chamber’s own new study (“ ‘Alarming’: 1 in 4 young people eye leaving Boston,” Business, March 13) shows that one of the main reasons young people consider moving away is that rent is far too high. It’s the fourth-highest in the country.

Zoning reforms that the chamber supports can make a small dent, but we also need to invest more money in affordable housing and to strengthen tenant protections. Boston has proposals to do both, with home rule petitions to create a real estate transfer fee to fund affordable housing and stabilize rents. Other municipalities do so as well, and the governor’s housing bond bill has language around the former. I’d welcome the chamber’s support for such clear solutions to an urgent problem facing the region.

Jonathan Cohn

Policy director

Progressive Massachusetts

PM in the News: “Midyear budget shortfall raises questions about Healey’s tax cuts”

“Midyear budget shortfall raises questions about Healey’s tax cuts,” WGBH, January 12, 2024.

Have Gov. Maura Healey’s tax cuts backfired?

That’s the argument coming from some on the left as Healey makes hundreds of millions of dollars in midyear budget cuts, just a few months after she signed off on the state’s first big tax-break package in two decades. But not everyone thinks the state’s current fiscal duress means the cuts were a bad idea.

Adam Reilly is joined by Mass. Taxpayers Foundation president Doug Howgate and Progressive Mass policy director Jonathan Cohn, who discuss the impact of the cuts and what they might portend for the future of budget-making in the state.

Op-Ed: A New Year’s resolution: Make Mass. affordable

Jonathan Cohn, “A New Year’s resolution: Make Mass. affordable,” CommonWealth, December 28, 2023.

Throughout 2023, we constantly heard elected officials talk about the need for tax cuts to make Massachusetts more “competitive,” pushing a debunked myth that we were about to see an exodus of the well-off due to the Fair Share Amendment and the overall tax landscape. The risk we really face is that our graduates won’t be able to stay here, that young couples won’t be able to make a family here, and that working people will be displaced from one neighborhood to the next before being driven out of the state entirely. All of this is avoidable with good policy.

So let’s hope – and pressure – our elected officials to embrace those policies. And to not give up on a New Year’s Resolution too soon.

PM in the News: “New Tax Cuts Prompt Debates about Affordability”

Sarah Robertson, “New Tax Cuts Prompt Debates about Affordability,” The Shoestring, November 21, 2023.

The child and dependent credit, described by Healey as the “most generous” in the country, was the largest single piece of the bill, representing $307 million in cuts. It is expected to provide around 565,000 families with a $440 annual tax credit per dependent, who can include children under 12 years old, seniors, and people with disabilities.

“I’m sure they can use it and welcome it, but we’re talking about a $440 tax credit like it’s somehow revolutionary for people when that’s not making a dent,” said Jonathan Cohn, policy director for Progressive Mass. “This state could be doing so much more by pooling money and investing in infrastructure to support parents rather than just giving people a check.”

….

The bill also raised the threshold at which the estate tax kicks in from inheritances of $1 million to $2 million.

“They’re throwing money at people,” said Cohn. “Many people in this state will die in debt, and the idea of putting that much focus on cutting the taxes on multi-million dollar estates is crazy.”

Cohn said he was disappointed in the Healey administration’s “misleading” characterization of the cuts as a way to address affordability. “The cost of living is at a crisis point for so many people,” he said. “The tax bill does not meaningfully address that.”

PM in the News: “We Can’t Tax-Cut Our Way to an Affordable Commonwealth”

Jonathan Cohn, “We Can’t Tax-Cut Our Way to an Affordable Commonwealth,” Fenway News, November 2023.

If Massachusetts wants to be an affordable state—attractive for people to move to, a place where people can thrive—that’s where our focus should be. And I hope that’s where our Legislature turns its attention for the rest of the session—and that legislators don’t have the audacity to say they don’t have the money to help make living here more affordable.

PM in the News: “We Don’t Have the Money” Doesn’t Cut It

Chris Lisinski, “Healey, not Baker, gets to sign big tax relief law,” State House News Service, October 4, 2023.

“Voices on the left were also less enthused about the final product. The Progressive Massachusetts group contrasted the $1 billion in relief with the roughly similar amount of revenue the state expects to generate this year from a new surtax on high earners, revenue from which will be earmarked for education and transportation investments.

“It is simply not acceptable for legislators to say ‘We don’t have the money’ when it comes to meeting basic needs, when they are willing to spend hundreds of millions of dollars on unnecessary and regressive tax cuts for the rich and large corporations,” the group said in an unsigned statement. “Our commonwealth has the resources we need to solve the great challenges we face; the question is whether our elected officials have the will to do so.” “