Has the ESA, or any other national group, spoken out against the new tax
legislation targeting graduate students?
One provision would tax the value of tuition waivers as “income,” despite
the fact that grad students never actually receive the money. But the bill’s
Republican supporters somehow argue that tuition which is not applied still
counts as a salary for purposes of taxation.
This is a thoroughly spiteful and gratuitous attack on graduate students by
the Republican establishment—some of the most powerful people in the country
abusing some of the least powerful. Graduate students have absolutely no
political clout; they can’t fight back and the Republicans know it. Graduate
students are paid wretchedly and often treated worse—and now they’re being made
scapegoats by the Republicans for the perceived sins of liberal academia.
Is anyone at ESA speaking out about this? Is anyone at all?
- J. A.
