While Partisans Fiddle…

Congressional Republicans and Democrats continue to do battle over taxes, with most Democrats advocating a moderate hike in the rates paid by those making over 250,000/year, and the GOP insisting that a raise in (historically low) rates amounts to “class warfare.”

It’s a classic conflict between irreconcilable worldviews: rightwing Republicans label taxation for anything other than military spending and corporate welfare as socialism;  the more radical see taxation as theft. Democrats respond that taxes are the dues we pay for civilization.

Meanwhile, we have stalemate.

I wonder if the antagonists might be able to “cut the baby,” Solomon-like, by agreeing to pursue corporations actively evading their civic responsibilities.

The largest American multinational companies parked an additional $206 billion of profits in offshore accounts last year, according to Bloomberg, bringing the total amount of profits stashed where U.S. tax officials can’t touch them up to about two trillion dollars.

 The 307 companies that Bloomberg examined now hold a combined $1.95 trillion offshore, allowing them to avoid paying U.S. taxes on those earnings. The majority of the total is concentrated in just a few corporate hands. The largest 22 of those companies hold more offshore than the other 285 combined.

 Surely, even the purveyors of  “makers and takers” rhetoric can see how wrong this is. After all, the corporations playing these games are shifting the tax burden to those who aren’t able to do so.

Talk about theft.

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