The Internal Revenue Service building in Washington. This year the standard deduction is $6,300 for most single income tax filers and $12,600 for most married couples.
Credit: AP

American taxpayers should take advantage of several big tax deductions, such as charitable giving, as they are likely to be far less valuable or even disappear next year.

With the Republicans controlling both the White House and Congress in 2017, major tax changes are expected. President-elect Donald Trump and House Republicans have offered separate plans that align on some points and diverge on others. Also in the mix is a 2014 proposal from then-House Ways & Means Chairman Dave Camp (R., Mich.), which tackles tough issues.

All three plans agree on lowering income-tax rates, which reduces the value of deductions and exemptions. All three plans also take further aim at “itemized” deductions—the write-offs listed on Schedule A of Form […]

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H.B. 1948, which passed the Pennsylvania House by a 140-58 vote, would scale back the availability of legal abortions from six months after fertilization to five, mandate spousal approval and require that a second physician be present in case the fetus survives the abortion. A violation would be a third-degree felony, punishable by up to seven years in prison and a $15,000 fine. In addition to restricting the time limit, the bill would officially rename second-trimester abortions “dismemberment abortion.”

Using the guise of a budget bill, Republicans tried to push through the bill to little avail Wednesday.

Gov. Tom Wolf has threatened to veto it if it […]

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Like pesticides? Trump’s got the right man for you.
Credit: Dave Martin/AP

To lead the transition of the Environmental Protection Agency, President-elect Donald Trump settled on notorious climate change denier Myron Ebell. The decision rattled climate activists—see Julia Lurie’s interview with Bill McKibben and David Roberts and Brad Plumer on Vox. But it isn’t just greenhouse gas emissions that are likely to get a free ride under an Ebell-influenced EPA. Farm chemicals, too, would likely flow unabated if Ebell’s agenda comes to dominate Trump’s EPA.

Ebell directs the Center for Energy and Environment at the Competitive Enterprise Institute. The group runs a  website, SafeChemicalPolicy.org, that exists to downplay the health and ecological impacts of chemicals.

If the incoming EPA takes its cues from Ebell’s group, the agency’s coming decisions on some widely used farm chemicals won’t be […]

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Chepko/iStock; Credit: robynmac/ Pittsburgh Water and Sewer Authority

This summer, 81,000 homes in Pittsburgh received a worrisome letter about their water. The local utility “has found elevated levels of lead in tap water samples in some homes,” it said. Seventeen percent of samples had high levels of the metal, which can cause “serious health problems.”

The situation was bad enough to attract the attention of Marc Edwards, the Virginia Tech professor who helped expose the water crisis in Flint, Michigan. “The levels in Pittsburgh are comparable to those reported in Flint,” he said in an interview with local TV station WPXI.

This was surprising because until this year, Pittsburgh’s lead levels had always been normal. So what happened?

First, a bit of background: In 2012, the city faced a dilemma. Though it had clean water, its century-old water system […]

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