Free Republic

Planning to tie the knot in Spain? It’s highly expensive wherever you wed. But, if you are, you had better take it into account Hacienda (the tax agency). Newlyweds across Spain now face unexpected tax demands as Hacienda intensifies scrutiny on wedding gifts. Authorities now actively remind couples that cash and presents from guests qualify as taxable donations, potentially adding thousands to post-wedding bills. The idea behind this move is to close loopholes in revenue collection with digital transfers becoming more prevalent. Average weddings in Spain exceed €24,000, everything taken into consideration, including wedding meals alone consuming €13,000 to €14,000,...

Military action in Iran is starting to impact prices at the pump as Americans have seen gas prices rise since strikes began in the Middle East on Saturday. We're keeping track of gas prices in California. The Get the Facts Data Team put together a map that shows what prices look like in your area using data provided by AAA. The map updates once a day early in the morning. You can view the map below. Crude oil prices in the U.S. have spike since Feb. 26 when it was tracked at about $65 per barrel. Want to see how...

Many Black, middle-class NYC property owners say they’d be among the biggest victims of the Democratic Socialists of America’s proposed tax hikes. Some told The Post the DSA’s Marxist measures — which include higher taxes for individuals making over $300,000, and taxing inheritances over $250,000 — would hurt New Yorkers like themselves who spent decades building up retirement accounts, paying off homes, and planning their estates to benefit their loved ones. “The reason you invest is to acquire wealth with the hopes of putting it towards your legacy, for your family — and this will greatly affect my family,” said...

"Democrats just cannot stop raising taxes. Their latest proposal would increase the top capital gains tax rate to 35.8% from the current 23.8%. This would impose the highest capital gains tax since 1978, the stagnant Jimmy Carter era. See the chart below:" eXCERPT. sEE url

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said on Wednesday that an increase in President Donald Trump's new temporary global import tariff to 15% from 10% was likely to be implemented sometime this week. The new tariff rate was announced by Trump in late February after the Supreme Court struck down his previous global tariffs under a national emergencies law. He initially imposed the 150-day tariffs under Section 122 of the Trade Act of 1974 at a lower 10% rate. "That's likely sometime this week," Bessent said on CNBC of the 15% rate order from Trump. During the 150 days, we will see...

A powerful San Francisco group is unleashing $10 million this year to kill taxes that they say will destroy the city’s fragile economic recovery — and potentially increase the price of food and goods for already cash-strapped residents. Neighbors for a Better San Francisco, a moderate advocacy group, plans to beat back a wave of lefty initiatives and candidates this year that they say will derail years of progress in liberal San Francisco, according to its director Jay Cheng. One of the group’s main targets is a so-called “CEO tax” — a June ballot measure backed by progressives and labor...

Zohran Mamdani’s socialist pals wrap their proposals in the most innocuous language possible. So when activists rally in Albany on Wednesday to pressure lawmakers to raise taxes, the Democratic Socialists of America claim the bill it backs would “create new brackets starting at $1 million” so that “they pay a slightly higher share in taxes.” Sounds fair. It’s also a lie. Sponsored by Assemblyman Demond Meeks and State Sen. Robert Jackson, the tax increases actually start at half that. For individual incomes over $450,000, and joint incomes over $500,000, the state tax rate would be raised by a point to...

NYC Mayor Mamdani just hired a former Planned Parenthood lawyer to prosecute perceived violators of New York’s civil rights code, which includes abortion. This is a new threat posed to Christian pro-life pregnancy centers already SLAPP’d by New York Attorney General Letitia James. Given the current financial straights facing NYC, it would behoove Mayor Mamdani to not waste taxpayer money in frivolous lawsuits, investigations, and other attacks against Christian pro-life organizations like CompassCare. This kind of evil weaponization of government against the good lifesaving work of Christian pro-lifers is why I wrote my latest book. During his bid for New...

President Trump said Saturday he’s going to bump his newly imposed global tariff to 15%, in the wake of the Supreme Court decision blocking his sweeping import taxes on international trading partners.The increase was “based on a thorough, detailed, and complete review of the ridiculous, poorly written, and extraordinarily anti-American decision on Tariffs issued yesterday, after MANY months of contemplation, by the United States Supreme Court,” Trump wrote on his Truth Social. “During the next short number of months, the Trump Administration will determine and issue the new and legally permissible Tariffs, which will continue our extraordinarily successful process of...

America’s top 1% enjoy a fifth of the economy’s income and pay nearly a third of its federal taxes. Many politicians think they should cough up much more. Zohran Mamdani, New York’s mayor, wants a new 2% city levy on incomes over $1m. Virginia, Rhode Island and Washington state are weighing up similar measures; Californians are likely this year to vote on a “one time” 5% levy on billionaires’ wealth. In Europe, too, there is a similar clamour to target the wealthy. France has seen a popular campaign for a wealth tax. And with Sir Keir Starmer weakened or doomed...

As national Democrats search for a unifying theme ahead of the fall’s midterm elections, a California proposal to levy a hefty tax on billionaires is turning some of the party’s leading figures into adversaries just when Democrats can least afford division from within. Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders traveled to Los Angeles on Wednesday to campaign for the tax proposal, which has Silicon Valley in an uproar, with tech titans threatening to leave the state. Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom is among its outspoken opponents, warning that it could leave government finances in crisis and put the state at a competitive disadvantage...

Mayor Zohran Mamdani laid out two potential paths Tuesday to close what he says is a $5.4 billion dollar budget gap in New York City. In one, Albany would raise taxes on the richest New Yorkers. In the other, the City would raise property taxes for the first time since the late 2000s. The City could generate $3.7 billion by raising the property tax by 9.5%, Mamdani said. Gov. Kathy Hochul has repeatedly said she is not on board the mayor's first, and more preferred, option. If Albany does not agree to taxing the wealthiest New Yorkers, Mamdani says the...

Dutch Lawmakers Approve a 36% Tax on Unrealized Crypto, Stock, and Bond Gains Starting January 2028, the Netherlands is set to require that residents pay tax on paper profits they have not yet cashed in, pending Senate approval. The Dutch House of Representatives on Thursday voted to pass the Actual Return in Box 3 Act (Wet werkelijk rendement box 3), a reform that will tax residents at a flat rate of 36% on the actual returns they earn from savings and investments, effective January 1, 2028. The bill replaces a system that taxed investment income based on assumed returns, a...

Washington state moved one step closer Monday to creating a personal income tax two years after the Legislature said it wouldn’t. Majority Democrats in the Senate advanced legislation on a 27-22 vote to tax households earning more than a million dollars. Passage of the bill followed a three-and-a-half hour debate on whether this will make for a fairer tax code or harm the economy and incite an exodus of Washington’s wealthy residents. House Speaker Laurie Jinkins, D-Tacoma, who watched the vote from the wings of the Senate, was all smiles as she returned to her chamber. “This is a place...

This week, California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) joined the many Californians now seeking their fortune elsewhere. The difference is that Newsom is planning to come back to California, even as billionaires, investors, and companies flee his state for greener pastures. Newsom and Democrats such as Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) were selling a brave new world that looked a lot like the broken old world. It was an ironic moment. They were addressing countries at the Munich Security Conference that had previously destroyed their economies through socialist and far-left policies. The rush of liberal Democratic officeholders to Europe was telling. A...

Over the course of 2025, the average tariff rate on U.S. imports increased from 2.6 to 13 percent. In this blog post, we ask how much of the tariffs were paid by the U.S., using import data through November 2025. We find that nearly 90 percent of the tariffs’ economic burden fell on U.S. firms and consumers. [...] We highlight two main results. First, 94 percent of the tariff incidence was borne by the U.S. in the first eight months of 2025. This result means that a 10 percent tariff caused only a 0.6 percentage point decline in foreign export...

In his famous 20th century novel "The Sun Also Rises," Ernest Hemingway’s character, Mike Campbell, was asked by a friend how his financial ruin had happened. Campbell replied to the question simply, "Two ways. Gradually and then suddenly." Just a cursory look at today’s headlines and one can see this very idea of "gradually and then suddenly" playing out in the fiscal health of many blue states. California, the poster child for a state heading down the road to financial ruin, is slated to lose four congressional seats in the 2030 census due to population loss. Moreover, major companies such...

California is committed to funding reproductive health care, pledging money to Planned Parenthood after federal funds were stripped from its clinics. On Wednesday, Gov. Gavin Newsom signed legislation to provide $90 million in one-time emergency funds for Planned Parenthood and other women's health providers. President Trump's tax bill cut off Medicaid funding to abortion providers across the U.S. in July. Last week, Planned Parenthood said at least 23 of its health clinics have been forced to close, including one location in Madera. …

Mayor Zohran Mamdani told state lawmakers on Wednesday that the only way out of the city’s $12 billion budget gap is to raise taxes on the wealthy. Hizzoner, during his first Tin Cup Day in Albany, formally called on the state Legislature to raise income taxes on people making more than $1 million by 2%. “I’m asking for a 2% raise in personal income taxes on the most affluent New Yorkers, someone earning $1 million a year. The top 1% of New York City can afford to contribute $20,000 more in taxes,” the young mayor said. “That 2% tax alone...

House Democrats proposed a sugar tax on Thursday that would impose another 3-cent charge per fluid ounce of applicable beverages, amounting to a 72-cent tax on a 24-ounce coffee. The sugar tax would be in addition to other state and local taxes, including Seattle's sugar tax, which amounts to a 1.75-cent-per-ounce tax on distributors of "sweetened beverages." The money would go toward expanding food assistance programs, despite studies showing that it could decrease sales. Rep. Chipalo Street, D-Seattle, and Rep. Alex Ramel, D-Bellingham, recognized this potential outcome when filing House Bill 2734, citing Seattle and other cities with sugar taxes...