Kerry OpEd: 7/21/05 Financial Times

[TayTay]

http://news.ft.com/cms/s/dc9e44e0-fa16-11d9-b092-00000e2511c8.html
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Excerpt:

Today, our tax policy rewards US multinational companies for locating operations abroad and reinvesting profits overseas. It is hard to imagine a more backward policy. By allowing companies to defer paying taxes on foreign income until they bring it home, we invite a double-whammy on our economy. First, companies have a tax advantage to move jobs overseas. Corporate taxes are, on average, one-third lower abroad. Second, companies face a tax when they bring earnings back and, therefore, have an incentive to reinvest profits in foreign economies.

In sanctioning these foreign tax havens, US companies who choose to stay at home suffer a disadvantage. Not only is this bad for business and a strain on capital; it is a disaster for American workers. There are 1.6m more unemployed Americans today than there were in 2000.

I propose a two-step solution. First, eliminate this perverse incentive for companies to house operations overseas. Second, use the tax savings to lower the corporate tax rate across the board at home. This means taxing companies on the profits of their foreign subsidiaries as they earn them, just like domestic profits. US companies must remain competitive in a global economy, so deferral would still be permitted for income earned when a company houses production in a foreign country solely to serve its market. But if you open a call centre in India to serve American customers, you have to pay taxes just like call centres in the US do.

Now is the perfect time for this policy. Tax legislation passed last year allows companies to repatriate profits at a reduced tax rate for a one-year period. Whatever you think about repatriation - and I believe the current tax holiday will do more harm than good because there is no guarantee of reinvestment in new jobs - this is the logical time for real reform. The policy I am proposing will bring a significant increase in tax revenue.

[whometense]

1. Oh, John...

I love it when you talk all wonky...:loveya:

[TayTay]

2. Hey, That's my line

Okay, we can share.

Ooooh, bring in the wonk, and I'm so smitten. (Help me!) :loveya:

[whometense]

3. The difference is that

you actually make an attempt to understand what he's saying. I just let the wonk wash over me like a soothing blanket. ;-)

[TayTay]

4. With varying degrees of success

Sigh! As I said in another thread, "You have to think with the brain you have, not the brain you wish you had." I do the best I can with what nature saw fit to give me.

[blm]

6. That's exactly my reaction. I feel a sizzle everytime he talks policy

and offers SOLUTIONS.


I'm going to post this up in the den of fire. heh

[globalvillage]

5. How can anyone argue with this logic

or with his proposal?

We need these jobs here. We need the added tax revenues. It addresses the business concerns. Basically, it's bulletproof.

US corporations don't want to outsource, but executives are driven to the bottom line. We need to not only remove outsourcing incentives, but to introduce some stimulus for moving these jobs back home. This does just that.

I like that he calls the current incentives perverse. That's exactly what they are. I would have used 'asinine', but that's just me.

[karynnj]

7. I have wondered how the Republicans on the committees

where Kerry has brilliantly explained these well crafted, rational solutions - listing what the intended benefits are - feel when they know the administration will stomp on them. I am filled with admiration at how hard Kerry (and his staff) seem to be working at a time when success seems really hard to get.

I honestly can't see why anyone would disagree with Kerry's logic here.

[TayTay]

8. Well, these are the same group of bastards

Who pulled the increase in death benefits for service people killed in Iraq from the budget bill. Of course, the cowards pulled it in the 'reconciliation committee' so the American people wouldn't have a name to put with this outrage.

The increase in the death benefit for troops killed in or because of Iraq (or in related service) was to rise from 12,500 to 100,000. Sen. Kerry has gotten this bill through the Senate once before. It is being resubmitted.

Now the cowardly Rethug douchebags have submitted a cloture motion to be voted on Tuesday morning to limit debate on a $442 Billion dollar Defense Appropriations bill. That means that the Dems have Monday, when the Senate is only sort of in session, to submit their amendments to this. Oh, and there is a plan to start charging wounded vets for their meals again when they are in-hospital due to injuries received in war. (Did I ever tell you that there simply is no place hot enough in hell to stash these friggin bastards.)

But, hey, that will clear the boards for Rethugs assh*les to vote on their other cloture motion, one to shut down debate on a bill limiting liability to gun manufacturers. Motherf*ckers! Burn in hell you cowardly bunch of two-faced, unpatriotic swine.