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Early on Saturday morning, the US Senate passed the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act. Given that the House passed its version of the tax bill on November 16, the House and Senate will now choose members for a conference committee to reconcile the two versions of the bill.

The House bill contains a provision that would make tuition waivers for graduate students subject to income tax, increasing the tax liability of hundreds of thousands of graduate students, including Classics graduate students at US institutions. The Senate bill, however, retains the tax exemption for graduate tuition student waivers. Many organizations and individuals are already advocating vocally for that exemption to be included in the reconciled tax bill.

The SCS, along with many other scholarly societies, issued this statement on the proposed tax legislation last week. The National Humanities Alliance, of which SCS is a member, has now issued this action alert and is making it easy for individuals in the US to contact their representatives in Congress in order to voice their concerns.