Garrett Watson

Federal Tax Policy @TaxFoundation. @StLawrenceU Alum. Arkansan. North Country NY Native. Aspiring aviation nerd. Married to @VictoriaBell. All views my own.

[Ashley Schapitl @AshleySchapitl]

This is all disqualifying for a job that 100 people in the entire country have the privilege to hold. If this were a Republican every Democrat would say so. The party replaced its presidential candidate 100 days before the election—there’s no reason to be stuck with this guy.

[Jake Sherman @JakeSherman]

HUGE scoop from @AndrewDesiderio and @LauraEWeiss16

MARK WARNER has told JOHN THUNE to try to get @pulte removed as DNI.

If he's in the job, Democrats are threatening to withhold their votes for FISA, which expires in 9 days.

FISA is at real risk of expiring due to Trump's decision to put PULTE in as DNI.

Almost certain that JOHNSON cannot put the bill on suspension now. And can he get it out of rules?

https://t.co/UkGDVuWdvX

[Garrett Watson @GS_Watson]

@Michael_Druggan It would not be a consumption tax, there’s no exemption for returns to waiting.

[Alex Durante @alex_durante_]

This is not true. We looked at this a few years back and found that looking at taxes at all levels of government, and accounting for transfers, our system is highly progressive. The overall effective tax burden for the bottom quintile was 10%, compared to 41% for the top quintile

[Donald Schneider @DonFSchneider]

One more time on this. If all you are doing is citing about $50bn in refunds as the OBBBA tax cut do yourself a favor and go to the revenue estimate (JCX3425) and ask, does this number make any sense (the answer is no)

[Jeremy Horpedahl 🥚📉 @jmhorp]

Cool paper from @JaredWalczak. To completely replace property taxes with sales taxes in Florida, you would need to at least double sales tax rates (but probably more, due to behavioral changes). A few counties would need to be 20% or 30%!

[NBC News @NBCNews]

An experimental vaccine from Moderna shows promise in keeping deadly skin cancer from returning for years, according to new clinical trial results. https://t.co/UCVfhRE8na

[New Liberals 🇺🇦🇹🇼🌐 @CNLiberalism]

OH GOT IT SO IT DOES WORK LIKE THAT

[Reese Gorman @reesejgorman]

News: Trump plans to drop the weaponization fund, per a source.

The conversation between Speaker Mike Johnson and Trump earlier today helped convince the president to drop the weaponization fund, source added

The fund received significant backlash from Hill Republicans and a number of House Republicans were looking for ways to stop this fund from happening.

Story TK.

[Garrett Watson @GS_Watson]

@texasrunnerDFW This data alone doesn’t tell us that.

[Derek Thompson @DKThomp]

This has quietly been a miracle month in medicine.

In the last 5 weeks we’ve got news on:

- retatrutide, the triple agonist GLP-1 from Lilly, basically melting fat and body-wide inflammation at record levels
- RevMed’s new pancreatic cancer drug showing unprecedented abilities to extend life
- small trial of a one-and-done PCSK9 gene editing therapy for slashing LDL cholesterol
- Mayo’s AI-assisted radiology showing vastly improved cancer detection
- this new therapy for metastatic solid tumors

This stuff is at varying levels of evidence. Retatrutide is ~100% on its way, other stuff needs more clinical trial data. But put it together and we’re maybe on the verge of majorly reducing the mortality of heart disease and cancer, the two leading causes of death in America.

[Michael Wiebe @michael_wiebe]

When NIMBYs start talking about "democratic rights" of local communities, what they really mean is the tyranny of the majority over willing landowners, developers, and homebuyers.

[Michael Wiebe @michael_wiebe]

Using the evidence from Auckland's upzoning, we infer that a 1% increase in housing stock reduces rents by 3.6%.

Rents fell by 21.6% and the housing stock increased by 6.9%, so the elasticity of rents to housing stock is ln(1-0.216)/ln(1+0.069) = -3.6.

[Chris Freiman @cafreiman]

Fictional socialism is about building a better world in which we can all flourish; real-world socialism is this:

[Patrick Heizer @PatrickHeizer]

I've never seen better evidence of "mass affluence" than this thread.

Between the "you need $3M to retire comfortably" and the "this economy is worse than a recession" takes, I'm increasingly convinced that 90%+ of Americans are utterly delusional about money.

[Liam Donovan @LPDonovan]

I'd wager most of my followers aren't avid @ezraklein show listeners, and I'm confident this account isn't on the radar of most of his audience, but I'm grateful to Ezra for being a gracious host and a thoughtful sparring partner as we discuss all things 2026 and beyond.

[Garrett Watson @GS_Watson]

@ArnabDatta321 @LPDonovan Agreed. I didn't realize who Ezra's guest was listening to the intro and I was glad to see it was @LPDonovan, the man/myth/legend himself.

[Sylvain Catherine @sc_cath]

Good idea 😉
“Overall, Social Security wealth plays a significant role in moderating wealth inequality trends. Including Social
Security wealth consistently reduces measured wealth concentration across all specifications for 1989 and 2022.”

[Phil Magness @PhilWMagness]

🧵We all saw Gabriel Zucman's NYT op-ed justifying the California wealth tax proposal, along with ostentatious claims that billionaires pay lower tax rates than average Americans. Let's dig into the methodology...

[Crémieux @cremieuxrecueil]

For the first year on record, wind and solar produced more electricity than coal in the U.S.