On today’s show, host Esty Dinur previews four films screening at the Wisconsin Film Festival: Celtic Utopia dir. by Dennis Harvey, Do You Love Me dir. by Lana Daher, Everybody to Kenmure Street dir. Felipe Bustos Sierra, and The Spies Among Us dir. Jamie Coughlin Silverman and Gabe Silverman.

Dennis Harvey is a filmmaker from Ireland, based in Sweden. With a cinema vérité approach and a particular sensitivity to the human, his work interrogates the political through the personal. He is a member of the European Film Academy, the Irish Film and Television Academy, and Noncitizen, a film collective which works to hand over the means of making films to migrants.

His film, Celtic Utopia will be screening tomorrow, Saturday, April 11 at 1:45 at the Barrymore Theatre.

Lana Daher is a filmmaker and multidisciplinary artist based in Beirut, Lebanon. With a background in fine arts and graphic design as well as filmmaking, she has long been active in Beirut’s vibrant art and music scenes, working across sound, image, and archival practices. Her work is grounded in deep research and intuitive storytelling, exploring the space between documentary and fiction by bringing different time periods and emotional landscapes into dialogue.

Her film, Do You Love Me, plays today, April 10 at 1:45 at the UW Cinematheque and Wednesday, April 15 at 8:45 at Flix Brewhouse, Cinema 7.

Felipe Bustos Sierra is a Chilean-Belgian film director, producer, and editor based in Scotland. His debut feature-length documentary, Nae Pasaran (2018), won the Best Feature award at the 2018 British Academy Scotland Awards, where Bustos Sierra was also nominated for Best Director. Bustos Sierra is also the founder and creative director of Debasers Filums, an independent film company based in Edinburgh and Glasgow.

His film, Everybody to Kenmure Street, will show on Wednesday, April 15 at 1pm at Flix Brewhouse, Cinema 8 and Thursday, April 16 at 5:30pm at Flix Brewhouse, Cinema 1 (rush only).

Jamie Coughlin Silverman and Gabe Silverman are journalists turned filmmakers. The Spies Among Us premiered at SXSW and won the Best Documentary Award in Warsaw. It’s been called the most important film about the topic since the Oscar-winning film The Lives of Others.

The Spies Among Us screens at the Bartell Theatre, Friday, April 10 at 8:30pm (rush only).

Featured image of full theatre.

The post Wisconsin Film Fest Roundup appeared first on WORT-FM 89.9.

It takes the average Latina, 12 extra months to earn what the average White, non-Hispanic man earns. That is because Latinas are only paid .55 cents to the dollar of […]

The post Yo Quiero Dinero! Storytelling with Midwest Mujeres appeared first on WORT-FM 89.9.

Ahead of Tax Day, host Bert Zipperer tackles gritty tax policy and the future of fair and progressive taxes. He’s joined by Jon Whiten of the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy (ITEP), a non-profit, non-partisan tax policy organization.

ITEP reports that people at the bottom of the economic spectrum pay the most when it comes to taxes. And in nearly all states, the top 1% of earners are taxed at the lowest rate. A recent analysis from ITEP finds that undocumented immigrants pay a considerable amount of taxes. Whiten says that states that invest in the child tax credit and earned income tax credit can help folks at the bottom of the economic ladder.

Whiten breaks down the differences between income, property, consumption, and corporate taxes. The 2017 and 2025 tax laws have made it so that companies like Tesla and Meta are paying little to no federal corporate income tax. And though a “flat tax” may sound fair, it’s a regressive form of taxation because “not everyone is in the same economic situation,” says Whiten.

Property taxes are the least abstract tax, you can see where your money is going, to schools or libraries, etc. But cutting property taxes would inevitably result in reductions to all kinds of public services. It’s possible to make property taxes more fair, like mansion taxes or tax credits like “circuit breakers.”

They also talk about how taxes help to build the common good. And we hear from callers about school referendums in Wisconsin, the attempt to pass a “circuit breaker” in Wisconsin, how the wealthy place a high demand on government services funded by taxes, the uses of debt, and more.

Jon Whiten is the Deputy Director at ITEP. He helps guide ITEP’s overall strategy and approach to policy change, works to properly resource ITEP’s work, and leads ITEP’s work to shape the public debate around tax policy and ensure that policymakers, advocates, and other stakeholders are using ITEP’s data and analysis in order to make sound decisions.

Featured image of a protester holding a sign at a Tax Day rally in New York City in 2012 via Flickr (CC BY-SA 2.0).

The post Flat Isn’t Fair and Other Lessons Before Tax Day appeared first on WORT-FM 89.9.