Tax loopholes encouraged more than 70 percent of Fortune 500 companies – including Stanley Black & Decker in Maryland – to maintain subsidiaries in offshore tax havens as of 2013, according to “Offshore Shell Games,” released today by the Maryland PIRG Foundation and Citizens for Tax Justice (CTJ). Collectively, the companies reported booking nearly $2 trillion offshore for tax purposes, with just 30 companies accounting for 62 percent of the total, or $1.2 trillion.
“Our tax code is broken, and it's hurting the public,” said Maryland PIRG Foundation Director Emily Scarr. “We’ve made it too easy for American multinationals to dodge taxes by setting up shell companies in tax havens, it hurts all Maryland taxpayers. We simply shouldn’t allow companies that use Maryland roads, and benefit from our education system and large consumer market, to take a free ride at the expense of the rest of us.”
“The loopholes in America’s corporate tax have grown so outrageous that our policymakers should be embarrassed,” said Steve Wamhoff, CTJ legislative director. “The data in this report demonstrate that a huge portion of the supposedly ‘offshore’ profits are likely to be U.S. profits that are manipulated so that they appear to be earned in countries like Bermuda or the Cayman Islands where they won’t be taxed. Policymakers should close the loopholes that make this manipulation possible.”
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4 comments:
Of course they use them.. and they should if and when available.
Time for the flat tax folks!
Yep. And we still dont get any raises.
The IRS will ruin your life over $200. But 50 BILLION?
The bribes and lawyers keep the wolves at bay quite competently.
The middle class? On the rack. Start stretching.
Don't forget who writes the tax code. "YOUR guy".
Keep cheering.
Well let's have 10,000 pages of tax code. That will plug all the loopholes.
Wait, that's what we have and that's how they hide the loopholes.
Fair Tax, Flat Tax, yeah I'll go for either. When congress can use the tax code to promote behavior they like and discourage behavior they don't like, suddenly lot's of money convinces them of what they like and don't like.
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