ASPEN, Colo. — President Bill Clinton says the nation’s corporate tax rate is “uncompetitive” and called for a lower rate as part of a “mega-deal” to raise the debt ceiling.
“When I was president, we raised the corporate income-tax rates on corporations that made over $10 million [a year],” the former president told the Aspen Ideas Festival on Saturday evening. “It made sense when I did it. It doesn’t make sense anymore — we’ve got an uncompetitive rate. We tax at 35 percent of income, although we only take about 23 percent. So we should cut the rate to 25 percent, or whatever’s competitive, and eliminate a lot of the deductions so that we still get a fair amount, and there’s not so much variance in what the corporations pay. But how can they do that by Aug. 2?”
Clinton also said Grover Norquist, who as president of Americans for Tax Reform is the GOP’s unofficial enforcer of no-new-taxes pledges, has a “chilling” hold on the nation’s lawmaking.
The former president said it has seemed like Republicans need any revenue concessions to be “approved in advance by Grover Norquist.”
“You’re laughing,” he told the crowd of 800. “But he was quoted in the paper the other day saying he gave Republican senators permission … on getting rid of the ethanol subsidies. I thought, ‘My God, what has this country come to when one person has to give you permission to do what’s best for the country.’ It was chilling.”
Betcha didn’t see that coming.
#78 I think simple use of regulatory bodies is basically balanced between producers and consumers; it differs only to the extent that products are produced but not sold. Consumers pay these costs through higher priced products, while producers are paying much less because of easier taxing standards.
It’s known as the tragedy of the commons, or the free-rider problem. Here is a list of some of our biggest free riders:
http://blogs.suntimes.com/sweet/2011/03/ten_giant_us_companies_avoidin.html
It’s an issue of contributions not use.
Greg is right, hell even Ben Franklin charged business owners in Philadelphia more for police than regular homeowners since they benefited from the service more.
Ambiguity is so much fun. Lets all secretly define words to support the ends we desire and then argue “in the commons” about what fairness is.
Ha, ha.
Liberty Lover is a self proclaimed libertarian==his views/definitions his protestations to the opposite without credibility only lead to anarchy. Who wants that?
Sea Lawyer surprises me on this issue, but again that comes down to the undefined use of words used in a discussion. profit vs benefit is a good example. But why drag in the school kiddies as a blatant misuse of your own evident definition? And the same with your other protestations. Really?
But Greg Allen makes a grave error right at the start: that corporations are people. They aren’t. Start with a faulty premise and everything flowing therefrom is suspect.
Society needs “X” dollars revenue in order to provide “X” level of services. The exact method(s) to get to X/revenue..X/services must be engaged in in good faith. That is impossible if X/revenue at all is viewed as slavery and X/services is seen as godless socialism.
Silly Hoomans.
#81, Some of the examples don’t tell the whole story, I don’t think.
They say these companies got refunds. A refund from the IRS doesn’t mean you didn’t pay taxes. It means you “over-paid” taxes after taking into account deductions (yes, I know that is what this thread is about)..
The only two examples where he actually stated they didn’t pay any taxes were Exxon Mobil and Citigroup.
Two were held up as an example of paying too little, Carnival Cruise Lines and Goldman Sachs.
Three received bailouts. Whom do we blame for that?
One only showed GROSS SALES without profits.
And a few of them didn’t make that much year to year so he aggregated up to 5 years to make it sound worse than it was.
What I am curious about is what each of those companies actually paid in taxes those years. A $19M refund on $10B in profits is a pretty small refund.
I think this article is more about shock value using large numbers than actually presenting a solution. So let’s put all of this in perspective.
The profits presented, for a single year, come to $52.4B.
That is 3.1% of the total Deficit, for this one year.
Shock value only. Take their entire profit and we are still 1.648 Trillion Dollars short of paying our bills this year.
Now that’s a shocking number.
#82, smartalix, your appeal to tradition aside, you really have to take each case individually to make any determination. As in your example, yes a business likely has more to lose from crime, or a building fire, than an individual, so it is reasonable to charge more to pay for the function.
In the case of product quality regulators, it is far less clear. The overwhelming benefit from quality regulation is the reduction of the information asymmetry problem. For consumers, it is very expensive to gather information about which products are of higher quality than others in a world with no standards; and the costs are potentially very high if you choose a poor quality one. Regulation reduces these costs, which is a benefit to consumers. Now by reducing this information asymmetry you have taken away a potential market advantage of those companies who are able to establish a reputation for high quality, but you have also helped them by reducing the “lemon” effect that occurs when consumers, who don’t know the actual quality, underestimate and are unwilling to pay the higher prices of the better products; reducing the high-quality producer’s ability to sell in the market. So yes, there are benefits for both sides in this case, but it is very unclear who gains the most; so you can’t immediately apply the same standard as before; especially when you consider that producers are also consumers. It is probably easiest in this instance to call it a wash and tax both sides equally.
#85–Sea Lawyer==you conclude your tax benefit analysis with: “So yes, there are benefits for both sides in this case, but it is very unclear who gains the most; so you can’t immediately apply the same standard as before; especially when you consider that producers are also consumers. It is probably easiest in this instance to call it a wash and tax both sides equally.” //// So in the metric of “product quality regulators” you think taxation should be based on benefits received and if this analysis reveals nothing discernible to treat both entities the same? There are so many other factors. Ability to spread the impact of such taxes? The ability to secure and repay loans based on being an ongoing entity? The several other factors you name yourself. How about the fact that I don’t eat chickens at all? How much should I be taxed for that product quality regulation?
There is no “science” to be applied to these social constructs. No real right vs wrong. Its more just pragmatically what will work, what is acceptable, and stumble our way forward.
I have to wonder if we have in fact lost track of the issue. What “business” gets taxed like a human being? In what way does that question even get off the ground?
bobbo, “What “business” gets taxed like a human being?”
Most “businesses” in this country are proprietorships or some form of partnership. So the “business” isn’t being taxed at all, the human who owns it is. That is why corporations are “people” – so they can pay their own taxes.
“Betcha didn’t see that coming”
Hmmm?
Clinton always sounded like Ronald Reagan on the stump.
And he meant what he said about as often as Obama means what Obama says.
So, he slipped back into “Candidate Clinton” mode.
Senility, I suppose.
But it’s just words out of the mouth of a politician, utterly devoid of real-world implications.
#60, LL
No. Grover Norquist is against raising any taxes. I never said that and obviously your comprehension problem raised its ugly head again.
I specifically stated that there are some “loopholes” that should be re-evaluated. I also pointed out that these “loopholes” are to set the government’s social agenda. If the government does not see the need to encourage oil drilling on federal lands then there is no reason to continue to offer incentives. Norquist would have all these corporate welfare programs remain.
#89, Grover Norquist is also against closing the loopholes and removing deductions. He considers those tax increases.
You’re probably closer to him than you realize, whether it is for the same reasons or not.
I’ll be out for the next couple of weeks.
Y’all have fun!