Line up for loopholes

The New York Times reported “corporate taxes made up 30 percent of all federal revenue in the ’50s, but as of 2009 that shrank to only 6.6 percent.” It’s easy to see how closing runaway loopholes and ending billions in giveaways amounting to corporate welfare would solve most if not all of our budget problems. (Include the bloated Pentagon and we’re in the black.)

I also read online that the senator from Vermont put out a Top 10 list of corporations with high profits but NO taxes in recent years. Remember this was only 10. Here are six you might recognize: Exxon-Mobil, Chevron, Bank of America, Goldman Sachs, Boeing and Carnival Cruise Lines.

I recently read that Wells Fargo earned $37 billion in profits but somehow got a $4 billion tax refund and that Hewlett-Packard reported over $9 billion in profits last year, but paid the same in taxes someone earning just $30,000 a year would.

Better still, America’s largest corporation, General Electric got $3 billion back from the IRS after realizing a $15 billion profit. Some banks who taxpayers bailed out and are now reaping huge profits (like Bank of America) haven’t paid anything in taxes in recent years.

Thomas Keenan

Coeur d’Alene