Has anyone heard of Win America? No., not surprised. Win America is a group formed by more than 160 lobbyist from companies like Pfiser, Google, and others. A full list is here: http://www.winamericacampaign.org/supporters/ . What they are pushing, with bipartisan support right now, is a tax holiday on earnings held in a foreign country. What most multi national companies do is store money in foreign countries to avoid or put off paying American taxes on those earnings, sometimes paying a much lower tax rate in the foreign nation and often none at all. (We have all heard of Banks in the Bahamas; etc. Pick your off-shore account...) If that money comes back into the U.S. it is then supposed to be taxed as earnings at the appropriate rate. What Win America is pushing for is a reduction of the standard rate of about 35% to 5% before any deductions are taken. That is ridiculously low, lower even than the 15% tax rate that Wall Street uses for capital gains! I would suggest that this be stopped. Let me explain why...
Let me start right off and state that there is nothing wrong with earning lots of money. Period. With out a doubt, earn as much as you can, and then spend it as you wish. It is your right after all, "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness", comes to mind.
What is wrong, however, is when that money earned on a fair playing field is then used to rewrite the rules to create an unfair advantage. This should be obviously wrong to everyone and yet I know there are people who think otherwise. Let me try to persuade you....
Think of it in simple terms, imagine a playground in the park, full of children playing. Some of them will be shy, others outgoing, some well raised and polite, and some bullies, some older and some younger. Now imagine if the older and thus taller kids didn't want the younger and thus shorter kids to play on the jungle jim (I loved those as a kid!) It would obviously be unfair if the bullies of the bunch simply shoved the younger kids away from the equipment. No one would second guess that or pretend it was ok or make excuses.
But what if the bullies could raise the ladder to the jungle jim out of the reach of the smaller kids, denying them the ability to participate? The older kids, and presumably the bullies could still reach it and play, all the smaller kids....not so much. Would this not be considered just as unfair as physically pushing the smaller kids around? I think it is every bit unfair (however unlikely rearranging playground equipment is!) After all it is not just the risk of physical harm that is wrong, it is the denying of the opportunity to participate fairly that is wrong.
Win America is trying to change the rules so that a few powerful entities can can change the rules to better suit them selves at the cost of the rest of us.
Of course Win America touts this as a jobs creation bill, saying that if the taxes are lowered further still, companies can use that money to hire more people. But what does history teach us? Has something similar ever happened before. The answer is of course yes.
In 2004 the government passed the American Jobs Creation Act which included as part of it the Homeland Investment Act (HIA). The HIA was a tax repatriation act that had specific restrictions on how companies could use the money brought back into the country from foriegn accounts. It was intended to spur corporations into hiring more people or invest heavily into R&D. Unfortunately it caused neither. In fact, of the roughly $300 billion that was repatriated, nearly all of it was given to shareholders throught share buy-backs. It was not used buy the firms to employ more people or invest in other American firms, or invest in internal research and development. I would like to direct your attention to this paper. It is a peer reviewed research paper on the actual outcome of the last repatriation tax holiday. A tough read, but an enlightening one none the less!
Let me start right off and state that there is nothing wrong with earning lots of money. Period. With out a doubt, earn as much as you can, and then spend it as you wish. It is your right after all, "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness", comes to mind.
What is wrong, however, is when that money earned on a fair playing field is then used to rewrite the rules to create an unfair advantage. This should be obviously wrong to everyone and yet I know there are people who think otherwise. Let me try to persuade you....
Think of it in simple terms, imagine a playground in the park, full of children playing. Some of them will be shy, others outgoing, some well raised and polite, and some bullies, some older and some younger. Now imagine if the older and thus taller kids didn't want the younger and thus shorter kids to play on the jungle jim (I loved those as a kid!) It would obviously be unfair if the bullies of the bunch simply shoved the younger kids away from the equipment. No one would second guess that or pretend it was ok or make excuses.
But what if the bullies could raise the ladder to the jungle jim out of the reach of the smaller kids, denying them the ability to participate? The older kids, and presumably the bullies could still reach it and play, all the smaller kids....not so much. Would this not be considered just as unfair as physically pushing the smaller kids around? I think it is every bit unfair (however unlikely rearranging playground equipment is!) After all it is not just the risk of physical harm that is wrong, it is the denying of the opportunity to participate fairly that is wrong.
Win America is trying to change the rules so that a few powerful entities can can change the rules to better suit them selves at the cost of the rest of us.
Of course Win America touts this as a jobs creation bill, saying that if the taxes are lowered further still, companies can use that money to hire more people. But what does history teach us? Has something similar ever happened before. The answer is of course yes.
In 2004 the government passed the American Jobs Creation Act which included as part of it the Homeland Investment Act (HIA). The HIA was a tax repatriation act that had specific restrictions on how companies could use the money brought back into the country from foriegn accounts. It was intended to spur corporations into hiring more people or invest heavily into R&D. Unfortunately it caused neither. In fact, of the roughly $300 billion that was repatriated, nearly all of it was given to shareholders throught share buy-backs. It was not used buy the firms to employ more people or invest in other American firms, or invest in internal research and development. I would like to direct your attention to this paper. It is a peer reviewed research paper on the actual outcome of the last repatriation tax holiday. A tough read, but an enlightening one none the less!
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