Since Obama announced America’s College Promise proposal in his State of the Union address, the media has been writing continuously about if such a plan were be probable. Who would pay for it? How would we pay for it? Should we pay for it? Probably the biggest concern out there is who will have to pay for it and to who will benefit most. One recent proposal was to start taxing 529s as a way to get funds for community colleges.
Media Matters for America have recently put together an article explaining some of the details of plan “What Media Miss on the Tax Breaks in Obama’s Free Community College Plan.” In the least complicated way possible, 529s are a way for parents to put money away for their children’s college education fund. They are so great because they provide nice federal and state tax breaks and are generally low maintenance. What Obama proposed to do was end those tax breaks, which is the reason for the uproar. On the whole though, if you can afford to put away money like that for your children’s college education, do you really need a tax break? As of Tuesday though, Obama has taken taxing 529s off the table, so we don’t really need to worry about that anymore.
In the future, check out Media Matters for America. This group is a “progressive research and information center dedicated to comprehensively monitoring, analyzing, and correcting conservative misinformation in the U.S. media.” They try to flesh out facts and ideas, since, unfortunately the media doesn’t always get their facts straight.