Executive Pay and the Great Tax Dodge

[Donnachaidh]

http://www.commondreams.org/view/2011/09/01-11

Before the deficit reduction “super-committee” embarks on a $1–2 trillion course of human slashonomics, it should take a hard look at the Institute for Policy Studies’ (IPS) eighteenth annual executive compensation report, which details how corporations are rewarding CEOs for aggressive tax avoidance—to the tune of at least $100 billion in lost tax revenues every year.

Executive Excess 2011: The Massive CEO Rewards for Tax Dodging reveals that last year twenty-five of the 100 most highly paid CEOs took home salaries greater than the amount their companies paid in 2010 federal income taxes. And it wasn’t because the corporations weren’t making dough—they averaged global profits of $1.9 billion, and only seven reported losses in US pre-tax income.

But these twenty-five companies shielded their profits in 556 tax haven subsidiaries in places like the Cayman Islands, Isle of Man, and Singapore, which proved to be a lucrative tax dodging strategy for the CEOs themselves: the twenty-five CEOs averaged $16.7 million in compensation, compared to $10.8 million for their peers in the S&P 500.

“What we’re seeing here is tax dodging, pure and simple,” says Sarah Anderson, who directs the global economy project at IPS and has coauthored the Executive Excess report for eighteen years running. “And tax dodging that’s benefiting the CEOs of these companies personally.”

More at the link --

[Volaris]

1. We really do need to do something about this...

to the point where I would even be willing to drop the Federal corp. rate by (gasp) 10-15%, with the caveat that Treasury have ABSOLUTE and UNQUESTIONABLE Power to Collect, including seizure of all Corp. holdings, and running that tax-dodging company as a for-profit, GOVT. company until such time as every single penny of due tax is properly paid. Can't do it or your company is insolvent? Guess what? Gordon Gecko now works for the Dept of the Treasury, and will be very promptly ripping your life's work to shreds in order to sell off the pieces to the highest bidder. Then We the People are going to bar you from legally sitting on the Board of Directors or holding a top management position at ANY corporate entity for the rest of your tax-cheating life. Failure to comply or attempts to dare us to do anything about it will result in a prison sentence. Fuck You and have a nice day.

Some balls-balls-to-the-wall, Libertarian, anti-government, Corporatist Friedman-ite(sp?) tool will try it. ONCE. After that guy gets made an EXAMPLE of, NO ONE will dare think about fucking over The People's Treasury EVER again.
Government "intrusion" into peoples lives should be fairly limited, I think. But where that intrusion is deemed necessary (and Legal) by We The People (against non-Person entities like Corporations) that intrusion should carry a weight equivalent to ABSOLUTE and unquestionable tyranny. Again- Fuck You and have a nice day.

Peace,