Remove logic for expired First-Time Homebuyers Credit

[martinholmer]

As @zrisher points out in pull request #893, the First-Time Homebuyers Credit was a feature of the income tax law only for the 2008-2010 period. Since the beginning (or so it would appear), Tax-Calculator has been incorrectly aging the 2008, and now 2009, values for e11580 into the years simulated by Tax-Calculator, which are 2013 and beyond.

This pull request corrects this situation by removing the logic for the expired First-Time Homebuyers Credit. The e11580 variable can still be read from the puf.csv file, but it will be removed from that file soon.

This correction increases aggregate income tax revenue and decreases some people's marginal tax rates. The increase in aggregate income tax revenues is about 0.9 percent or about $16.6 billion in 2022. The decrease in marginal tax rates are enough to move some filing units into lower marginal-tax-rate histogram bins. There are no changes in other unit test results, or in any validation test results, or in any reform comparison results.

@MattHJensen @feenberg @zrisher @Amy-Xu @GoFroggyRun

[codecov-io]

Current coverage is 98.13% (diff: 100%)

Merging #914 into master will decrease coverage by <.01%

@@             master       #914   diff @@
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  Files            13         13          
  Lines          1821       1819     -2   
  Methods           0          0          
  Messages          0          0          
  Branches          0          0          
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- Hits           1787       1785     -2   
  Misses           34         34          
  Partials          0          0          

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[martinholmer]

I would like some feedback on whether or not @zrisher and I are understanding correctly the status of the First-Time Homebuyers Credit. Our understanding is that it has expired and it is not available in the years that Tax-Calculator simulates (2013+). Is that a correct understanding of the situation?

If I hear nothing or get only confirmations that our understanding is correct, I will merge pull request #914 (which eliminates the First-Time Homebuyers Credit from the Tax-Calculator) during the day on Wednesday, September 14th.

@MattHJensen @feenberg @Amy-Xu @GoFroggyRun

[feenberg]

It has expired after 2010.

dan

On Tue, 13 Sep 2016, Martin Holmer wrote:

I would like some feedback on whether or not @zrisher and I are understanding
correctly the status of the First-Time Homebuyers Credit. Our understanding is that it
has expired and it is not available in the years that Tax-Calculator simulates
(2013+). Is that a correct understanding of the situation?

If I hear nothing or get only confirmations that our understanding is correct, I will
merge pull request #914 (which eliminates the First-Time Homebuyers Credit from the
Tax-Calculator) at the end of the day on Wednesday, September 14th.

@MattHJensen @feenberg @Amy-Xu @GoFroggyRun

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[martinholmer]

Dan @feenberg said:

It [the First-Time Homebuyer Credit] has expired after 2010.

Thanks for the confirmation, Dan.