WASHINGTON—The tax bill currently being rammed through Congress won’t eliminate the $250 tax
deduction teachers can take for spending their own money on school supplies. The compromise bill released Dec. 16 split the difference between the House version passed in November, which would have eliminated the deduction, and the Senate version, which would have doubled it to $500. The $500 deduction would be “closer to what most of my colleagues spend,” Sonia Smith, president of the Chesterfield Education Association in Virginia, told CNN. “And I can tell you for an elementary school teacher, it’s far more.” The American Federation of Teachers and the National Education Association both continue to oppose the bill. “Clearly, Congress heard the outcry from educators and parents when House Republicans tried to eliminate the $250 deduction for school supplies,” NEA President Lily Eskelsen García said in a statement. “But the overall GOP tax bill is full of giveaways to corporations and the wealthy.” On Dec. 15, she posted on Twitter that the bill’s tax cuts for the rich could lead to $250 billion in reductions in school funding and put 250,000 educators’ jobs at risk. Read more
