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Taxes

How The Toothless IRS Lets The Rich Off Easily

June 27, 2021 David Cay Johnston, DC Report. , , ,
The amount of additional taxes that the richest Americans owed after the IRS audited their tax returns fell more than 99% in Donald Trump’s first full year in office, data tables released this week show. Among households making on average $30 million in 2018, IRS auditors recommended less than $5.4 million in additional tax. That’s not the extra tax owed by one rich tax cheat. That’s the total for all 26,517 households reporting income of at least $10 million in 2018—the first year of the huge tax giveaway Trump and the Radical Republicans in Congress engineered in the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017. The recommended additional tax under Trump fell 99.1% from the $610.4 million that tax auditors recommended in 2010, Barack Obama’s first full year as president.

Outrage At ProPublica Tax Leaks Underscores Their Importance

June 22, 2021 Ari Paul, Fairness And Accuracy In Reporting. , , ,
A ProPublica report (6/8/21) on the leaked federal tax documents of super-wealthy individuals has bolstered the economic left’s argument that the US economy is set up in favor of the wealthiest. The report doesn’t show illegal activity; that’s what makes it so damning. According to ProPublica, it “demolishes the cornerstone myth…that everyone pays their fair share and the richest Americans pay the most.” Examining the leaked taxes of billionaires like Jeff Bezos, Michael Bloomberg, Warren Buffett and Elon Musk, the investigation found that the wealthiest can—perfectly legally—pay income taxes that are only a tiny fraction of the hundreds of millions, if not billions, their fortunes grow each year.

The Secret IRS Files

June 9, 2021 Jesse Eisinger, Jeff Ernsthausen and Paul Kiel, ProPublica. , , ,
In 2007, Jeff Bezos, then a multibillionaire and now the world’s richest man, did not pay a penny in federal income taxes. He achieved the feat again in 2011. In 2018, Tesla founder Elon Musk, the second-richest person in the world, also paid no federal income taxes. Michael Bloomberg managed to do the same in recent years. Billionaire investor Carl Icahn did it twice. George Soros paid no federal income tax three years in a row. ProPublica has obtained a vast trove of Internal Revenue Service data on the tax returns of thousands of the nation’s wealthiest people, covering more than 15 years. The data provides an unprecedented look inside the financial lives of America’s titans, including Warren Buffett, Bill Gates, Rupert Murdoch and Mark Zuckerberg.

Outside Amazon Fulfillment Center, Workers Demand Tax Fairness

June 4, 2021 Michael Moore, Workday Minnesota. , , ,
Minnesota workers unfurled a “Tax the Rich” banner outside Amazon’s MSP1 fulfillment center here today. It was a not-so-subtle suggestion to state lawmakers about how they might pay for investments in child care, paid family leave, education, infrastructure and other supports for working families. Tyler Hamilton, in his fourth year working at MSP1, said he and others inside the facility could use a little support right now. “Honestly, I’m tired,” the Maplewood resident said during a press conference organized by local unions. “And I’m not just tired from working night shift, even though I’m a night-shift guy. “I’m tired from working in this building behind me for over a year during the coronavirus pandemic and having to deal with all the stupid stuff Amazon does all the time – and they get away with.”

SALT Cap Repeal Would Exacerbate Racial Inequities

April 22, 2021 the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy. , , ,
A new analysis from the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy provides critical data for the debate over whether to repeal the $10,000 cap on state and local tax (SALT) deductions. The report, Not Worth Its SALT: Tax Cut Proposal Overwhelmingly Benefits Wealthy, White Households, finds that repeal of the SALT cap without other reforms would worsen economic disparities and exacerbate racial inequities baked into the federal tax system. Black and Hispanic families are respectively 42 percent and 33 percent less likely to benefit from SALT repeal than white families. Overall, 72 percent of the benefit of SALT repeal would go to white households. More specifically, white households earning more than $200,000 a year are 6.7 percent of all households but would receive 66.8 percent of the benefit of SALT repeal.

Tax Resisters Divert Their Money From War To Human Welfare

April 17, 2021 Ella Fassler, Truthout. , , ,
President Biden’s foreign policy to date is largely indistinguishable from Trump’s. His administration hasn’t reversed tortuous sanctions against Iran, the United States continues to bomb Somalia, and there’s no indication that the U.S. will shutter any of its 800 military bases around the world. In February, Biden authorized airstrikes in Syria, killing at least 22 people. His “national security” team is as hawkish as they come. Biden broke with Trump’s policies when he announced that the U.S. would leave Afghanistan by September 11, 2021, continuing the military presence there four months later than the May 1 deadline Trump set with the Taliban. Biden’s record indicates that people in the imperial core will need to take it upon themselves to throw a wrench in the war machine.

55 Corporations Paid $0 In Federal Taxes On 2020 Profits

April 7, 2021 Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy. , ,
At least 55 of the largest corporations in America paid no federal corporate income taxes in their most recent fiscal year despite enjoying substantial pretax profits in the United States. This continues a decades-long trend of corporate tax avoidance by the biggest U.S. corporations, and it appears to be the product of long-standing tax breaks preserved or expanded by the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA) as well as the CARES Act tax breaks enacted in the spring of 2020. The tax-avoiding companies represent various industries and collectively enjoyed almost $40.5 billion in U.S. pretax income in 2020, according to their annual financial reports. The statutory federal tax rate for corporate profits is 21 percent. The 55 corporations would have paid a collective total of $8.5 billion for the year had they paid that rate on their 2020 income.

We Should Be Taxing The Rich, Not The Unemployed

March 4, 2021 Jake Johnson, Commondreams. , , ,
With tax season well underway, many Americans who lost their jobs due to the coronavirus pandemic and found some relief in supercharged unemployment benefits last year are discovering that they now owe the federal government hundreds—even thousands—of dollars in surprise payments, an economic nightmare for low-income people and a looming political catastrophe for the party currently in power. Because unemployment benefits in the United States are classified as taxable income, a potentially significant portion of the estimated 40 million Americans who received unemployment insurance (UI) in 2020 "will be in for a rude awakening" when they find out "they are on the hook for thousands of dollars in owed income taxes at the federal and, in some cases, the state level," Brian Galle and Elizabeth Pancotti warned in a report for The Century Foundation last month.

Taxes On The Rich: One-Sixth Of What They Used To Be

February 19, 2021 Chuck Collins and Bob Lord, Inequality.org. , ,
According to a new IPS briefing paper, the richest .01 percent of Americans, about 33,000 lucky souls today, now pay just one-sixth of what they used to pay in tax, when measured as a percentage of their total wealth. The top .01 percent in America is a phenomenally wealthy group. Even during America’s most egalitarian periods, the average member of the top .01% held over 200 times the wealth of the average American. Today, the wealth of the average top .01 percenter is nearly 1,000 times that of the average American and is closing in on one billion dollars. Hence, it doesn’t matter to the top .01 percent what type of tax they pay, be it income, sales, property or anything else. Taxes don’t influence their spending decisions or such mundane things as how many hours they work, when they retire, or whether their spouse must work.

Huge Study Of 50 Years Of Tax Cuts For The Wealthy

December 16, 2020 Grace Dean, Business Insider. , , ,
Large tax cuts for the rich don't lead to economic growth and employment but instead cause higher income inequality, a new study that examined tax cuts over 50 years suggested. A recent paper by David Hope of the London School of Economics and Julian Limberg of King's College London found that tax cuts for the rich in 18 countries predominantly benefited the wealthy. "Our analysis finds strong evidence that cutting taxes on the rich increases income inequality but has no effect on growth or unemployment" in the short and long term, the researchers wrote. After major tax cuts for the rich were introduced, the top 1% share of pretax national income increased by almost 1 percentage point, they found.

Voters Pass A Tax On The Rich To Pay Teachers More

November 9, 2020 Austin Walker, KVOA. , , ,
Marana, AZ - Prop 208, Invest in Ed, passed. A 3.5 percent tax increase will be applied to any individual making more than $250,000 a year or if a household makes more than $500,000 a year. That money will go towards public education. Meagan Brown, a special education teacher at Twin Peaks School in Marana said this additional funding is needed for the state. "Long story short, I just don't want teachers leaving," Brown said. It takes a special person to be a teacher. Brown said she's been doing it for a while.

How Big Corporations Are Draining The Life Out Of A Sick America

September 2, 2020 By Paul Buchheit, Commondreams. , , ,
Our richest corporations are much to blame for the free-market "winner take all" philosophy that has caused over half of our nation to try to survive without adequate health care and life savings. With the 2017 corporate tax cuts came the lofty assurances that money would be freed up for new investment in jobs and R&D. So what happened? Hypocrisy happened. In the following year, S&P 500 companies set a new record for buying back their stock to artificially boost stock prices for management and investors—a practice that was illegal until the Reagan years. While about a third of S&P companies are now curtailing stock buybacks in response to the pandemic, others have depleted so much of their funds that they have turned to the pandemic-inspired CARES Act for relief to "distressed industries."

Amazon Taxed! Lessons Of The Tax Amazon Victory In Seattle

July 16, 2020 By Logan Swan, Socialist Alternative. , , ,
The Tax Amazon movement and Seattle’s working class won a historic victory on Monday, July 6. Following a three year struggle against the richest man in the world – Jeff Bezos – and his political establishment, we’ve won a tax on big business in the Seattle City Council that will raise an estimated $210-240 million a year, creating tens of thousands of green union jobs by building permanently affordable social housing. This victory was entirely due to the power of our movement and our threat to take the Amazon Tax to the ballot if the City Council failed to act. This offensive win is a historic example of the power of class struggle, and it could not come at a better time. Cities and states across the country are pushing extreme austerity budgets in response to the pandemic-triggered budget shortfalls as we enter into another deep crisis of capitalism.

The US Response To Covid-19 Has Lavished Wealth On The Rich

May 18, 2020 Miles Kampf-Lassin, In These Times. , , ,
According to a recent report from the Institute for Policy Studies, America’s billionaires saw their wealth shoot up by $282 billion in just 23 days as the country was sheltering in lockdown. Overall, U.S. billionaire wealth grew by nearly 10% at the same time over 20 million people filed for unemployment, and by April 10 had passed $3.2 trillion—topping last year’s level. To take just one example, Jeff Bezos, Amazon CEO and already the richest person in the world, saw his fortune inflate by $24 billion in the first three months of the year, a surge the report’s authors say is “unprecedented in the history of modern markets.” Meanwhile, his workers have staged a series of walkouts and other labor actions to protest a lack of basic workplace protections as warehouse employees have fallen ill with the virus, and some have died. 

Low Income/Simple Living As War Tax Resistance

May 8, 2020 National War Tax Resistance Coordinating Committee. , , ,
There are many methods of war tax resistance. Each accomplishes a different set of goals and involves a different level of personal risk. This pamphlet explores ways to eliminate your U.S. federal income tax by keeping income low and by using legal tax-reducing measures. It shows you how to find your “tax line” — the level below which you will have no federal income tax at all. It also describes some benefits and challenges of low-income tax resistance, and shows how you can reduce or eliminate other tax payments in similar ways. This is the 5th in a series of Practical War Tax Resistance pamphlets produced by the National War Tax Resistance Coordinating Committee (NWTRCC). You can find a listing of other NWTRCC publications at the end of this pamphlet along with a resource list for further reading on the art of simple living.
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