{"id":52209,"date":"2017-11-14T05:37:20","date_gmt":"2017-11-14T05:37:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.biphoo.com\/bipnews\/?p=52209"},"modified":"2017-11-14T05:37:20","modified_gmt":"2017-11-14T05:37:20","slug":"ohio-state-students-gather-to-protest-latest-gop-tax-bill","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.biphoo.com\/bipnews\/news\/ohio-state-students-gather-to-protest-latest-gop-tax-bill.html","title":{"rendered":"Ohio State students gather to protest latest GOP tax bill"},"content":{"rendered":"

Ohio State students gather to protest latest GOP tax bill<\/span><\/strong><\/span><\/h2>\n

Ohio State students gather to protest latest GOP tax bill:- For the past week, Kendra Dickinson has spent part of her morning contacting her elected officials \u2014 from Sens. Rob Portman and Sherrod Brown to congresswoman Joyce Beatty and President Donald Trump \u2014 to voice her opposition to congressional Republicans\u2019 proposed tax bill.<\/span><\/p>\n

In particular, Dickinson, a second-year doctoral candidate in Hispanic linguistics, takes issue with a provision that would reclassify tuition waivers graduate students currently receive as income instead.<\/span><\/p>\n

About five hours after Dickinson sent her messages Monday morning, she joined hundreds of people \u2014 mostly graduate students, professors and undergraduates \u2014 gathering on The Oval, and then later walking to the Ohio Union, to further protest the bill.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cIf I had known that it would be this way I probably wouldn\u2019t have even started graduate school,\u201d Dickinson said. \u201cThis is not what we signed up for. Had [this provision] been in place, that would\u2019ve absolutely, 100 percent been a deterrent.<\/span><\/p>\n

Specifically, the \u201cTax Cuts and Jobs Act\u201d would count stipends or covered tuition graduate students and doctoral candidates often receive from universities for teaching or conducting research during their tenure as taxable income. Currently, the government only taxes a student\u2019s stipend, not their waived tuition.<\/span><\/p>\n

The average salary for a graduate research assistant is less than $30,000, according to a Vox article.<\/span><\/p>\n

According to the Chronicle of Higher Education, about 55 percent of all graduate students had adjusted gross incomes of $20,000 or less and nearly 87 percent reported incomes of $50,000 or less.<\/span><\/p>\n

In Dickinson\u2019s case, she said she makes a little less than $17,000 per year with her research and teaching stipend while she receives a tuition waiver of about $33,000. If the bill passed, she said instead of falling into the 14 percent tax bracket, her new \u201cincome\u201d of about 50,000 would be taxed at about 20 percent.<\/span><\/p>\n

If passed, the bill could cost students \u2014 on average \u2014 up to an additional $2,000 each year, according to the Vox article.<\/span><\/p>\n

At Ohio State there are 10,708 master\u2019s students and 3,219 postbaccalaureate professional students across all campuses. More than 4,300 students receive nontaxable tuition waivers currently, according to a letter released Monday by University President Michael Drake.<\/span><\/p>\n

For in-state students, graduate and professional school costs $31,093 each year; for out-of-state students, it costs $52,561.<\/span><\/p>\n

In the letter, Drake urged Congress to reconsider the bill\u2019s provisions specifically affecting students.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cAs you continue to work on H.R. 1, the \u2018Tax Cuts and Jobs Act,\u2019 I wanted to express concern over provisions that will have negative consequences for students, families and Ohioans who rely on research universities for undergraduate and graduate education \u2026\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWithout this provision in place, these students will be subject to a major tax increase, making it difficult for universities to recruit them and thus hindering our research and innovation mission.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Noah Charles has been interested in physics since he got his first Isaac Newton book when he was 10 years old. He is one of the many students at Ohio State who would be affected by the tax increase.<\/span><\/p>\n

To Charles, a fourth-year graduate student in physics, becoming a physicist is \u201call that I ever thought that I was going to do.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Now, a teacher and researcher at the university, he worries his full potential in academia won\u2019t be met should the bill pass because he would no longer be able to afford his schooling. The House is expected to vote for the bill Thursday while the final version of the Senate\u2019s bill is still underway.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI think that graduate student education would change forever if this bill passes,\u201d he said. \u201cI will personally be devastated because I will have to leave [Ohio State]. I don\u2019t want to do that. I love the research that I do and really like the teaching that I do.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

He said the cost of school would be too much for him to continue his research, which would be detrimental in his post-graduation job hunt.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI afford grad school right now in the way that many of us do \u2014 by pinching pennies,\u201d he said. \u201cIf I graduate too early it would significantly hamper my job prospects in the years to come. I still have things I want to do while I\u2019m here.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

He said the bill\u2019s creation implies the GOP does not think graduate students are important, \u201cand funding tax cuts for the ultra-wealthy is much more important.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Dickinson added: \u201cI think it\u2019s abhorrent that the same tax plan would decrease taxes on the rich and the corporations to the detriment of graduate students who are individual human beings making a basic living for taking classes, teaching classes that no other instructor wants to teach and that we\u2019re expected to do research and be productive scholars with a minimal salary.\u201d <\/span><\/p>\n

When the nearly 90-minute protest ended at the Union, with chants of \u201cMoney for jobs and education, not war and deportation\u201d ringing, the crowd started to disperse. Some lingered to ask about additional action they could take, and, like Sarah Little, some signed petitions.<\/span><\/p>\n

Then, they had to get back to work. For Little, a second-year doctoral candidate in Hispanic linguistics, that meant studying for an exam in her introduction to audiology class; grading papers for the Spanish 1102 course she teaches; preparing for the oral exams she is administering Tuesday; and, if she has time, continue analyzing data for a final research project.<\/span><\/p>\n

Source:-\u00a0https:\/\/www.thelantern.com\/2017\/11\/ohio-state-students-gather-to-protest-latest-gop-tax-bill\/<\/span><\/p>\n

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