Multinational Shell Game Hurts Local Business

[marmar]

via CommonDreams:



Published on Monday, August 2, 2010 by OtherWords

Multinational Shell Game Hurts Local Business
Tax havens create a fundamentally unlevel playing field between multinational corporations with overseas tax havens and local Main Street businesses.

by Debra Ruh


As a small business owner, I pay my taxes and give charitable contributions to ensure that my community is a healthy and vibrant place. My company is dedicated to making technology, communications, and the Internet in line with federal disability laws and accessible to everyone--including wounded veterans and people with all types of disabilities. The success of my business is tied to my community's health.

So I was troubled to realize, thanks in part to overseas tax havens, that we have one tax system for multinational companies and another for small businesses and ordinary taxpayers.

Tax havens enable American multinationals to shift income and assets between global subsidiaries in order to dodge taxes. They pretend their profits are earned at their subsidiary in a low-tax haven country, such as the Grand Cayman Islands, and their losses generated in Hometown, USA, so they pay little or no taxes.

Business and Investors Against Tax Haven Abuse, a new coalition pressing for change, estimates that U.S. multinationals avoid at least $37 billion a year thanks to tax havens. Responsible Main Street businesses and individual taxpayers are left to pay the tax bills for defense, schools, roads, and other infrastructure investments vital to our quality of life. ..........(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.commondreams.org/view/2010/08/02-6

[Liberal_in_LA]

1. K&R

[BeHereNow]

2. Well yes, that is the ruse- now what can we do about it? n/t

bhn