WASHINGTON, Oct. 29 – Major corporations are contributing to campaigns, lobbying and spending “whatever it takes” to block international tax reform that would save American taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars.
In its new report Who Slows the Pace of Tax Reforms?, the U.S. Public Interest Research Group profiles corporations which have signed onto one or more letters from the PACE coalition which stridently oppose international tax reform. The report shows how this “dirty dozen” benefits from lucrative federal contracts, yet do not pay their fair share of taxes and spend heavily to keep block tax reform.
Highlights include these facts:
• The corporations profiled are twelve of the 100 largest publicly traded U.S. contractors and they received over $10 billion in government contracts in 2008 alone.
• The “dirty dozen” maintain over 440 subsidiaries in tax haven countries or financial privacy jurisdictions.
• The same dozen corporations spent a collective $37 million for 2008, over $100,000 a day, and over $33 million so far for 2009, on lobbying, while also spending over $6 million (in 2008) in campaign contributions from their political action committees to candidates and parties.
“The truth is, corporations know that contributing to campaigns and spending liberally on lobbying can help reap valuable dividends in policy decisions. Our flawed system helps to slow the pace of reform on important issues like closing tax loopholes," said Lisa Gilbert, U.S. PIRG’s Democracy Advocate and a coauthor on the report.
Nicole Tichon, U.S. PIRG’s Tax and Budget Reform Advocate added, “The reality is when corporations fail to pay their fair share of taxes, that burden is passed on to ordinary taxpayers. It’s time for the law to catch up to reality.”
Congress is currently considering legislation to reform both the international tax system as well as the way politicians finance their campaigns. The issue of international tax reform has also surfaced in the House version of the health care bill, and an amendment to end the use of tax havens may be offered on the Senate side as a possible way to help finance health care reform.
Click here to read Who Slows the Pace of Reform? online or to download a PDF version.
# # #
U.S. PIRG, the federation of state Public Interest Research Groups, is a non-profit, non-partisan public interest advocacy organization.
For more information on U.S. PIRG’s related campaigns: Close Corporate Tax Loopholes, Campaign Finance Reform or the Lobby Reform, follow these links.
Follow us on Twitter
