Tax Loopholes For Rich Cost Canada $16 Billion A Year: Study

Closing five tax loopholes that mostly benefit the wealthy would raise nearly $16 billion annually for Canada’s federal and provincial governments, according to a study from a prominent economist.

Toby Sanger says these tax loopholes — which have grown more generous since the late 1990s — have increased inequality and led to greater financial instability.

How to Repeal the Tax Loophole That Allows Companies to Hide Their Profits in Offshore Accounts

More than a third of a century after Ronald Reagan led America down a costly and unnecessary path into extreme income and wealth inequality, the opportunity to restore broad prosperity is rising before us. This is a moment not for despair, but resolve—and hard work.

Income inequality has become so outrageous that even Republicans vying for their party’s presidential nomination are talking about it, though not their party’s role in creating it or any workable solutions. On television the talking heads wring their hands, saying, “If only we could afford the costs of digging ourselves out of the economic hell most Americans have been shoved into.”

The Loophole Big Oil Uses to Pump More Crude

When the National Energy Board Joint Review Panel recommended cabinet approve Enbridge's Northern Gateway pipeline project in December (with 209 conditions), it was greenlighting its "applied-for" export capacity of an average 525,000 barrels a day on the crude oil export pipeline and 193,000 barrels a day on the condensate import pipeline.

That alone raised public hackles. What wasn't discussed is the fact that Enbridge has the chance to export much more, and with less oversight, thanks to a loophole in the National Energy Board Act.

"Makes Absolutely No Sense": David Cay Johnston on Budget Deal That Helps Billionaires, Not the Poor

A bipartisan budget deal to avert another government shutdown comes before the Senate this week. The vast majority of House members from both parties approved the two-year budget agreement last week in a 332-to-94 vote. It is being hailed as a breakthrough compromise for Democrats and Republicans. The bill eases across-the-board spending cuts, replacing them with new airline fees and cuts to federal pensions. In a concession by Democrats, it does not extend unemployment benefits for 1.3 million people, which are set to expire this month. To discuss the deal, we are joined by David Cay Johnston, an investigative reporter who won a Pulitzer Prize while at The New York Times. He is currently a columnist for Tax Analysts and Al Jazeera, as well as a contributing editor at Newsweek.

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As Workers Strike Against Low Wages, Fast-Food CEOs Fatten Pockets with Taxpayer-Subsidized Pay

As fast-food workers stage a one-day strike, a new report exposes how the industry’s CEOs have not just saved money by paying workers low wages, but have used the government to subsidize their own million-dollar salaries with taxpayer dollars. That is because a loophole in the tax code lets companies deduct the costs of performance-based executive pay. We are joined by Sarah Anderson, director of the Global Economy Project at the Institute for Policy Studies and author of the new report, "Fast Food CEOs Rake In Taxpayer-Subsidized Pay."

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Feds Call Cluster-Bomb Bill Loophole Necessary Amid International Criticism

OTTAWA - Officials from Foreign Affairs and the Defence Department defended a loophole Thursday in a much-maligned bill that would ratify Canada's participation in the international treaty to ban deadly cluster bombs.

The officials told the House of Commons foreign affairs committee that the so-called interoperability clause is necessary to allow Canada to participate in joint operations with countries that are not signatories to the Convention on Cluster Munitions — namely the United States, which has opted out of the treaty.

IRS Pursuing Crackdown On 'Stateless Income' Tax Loophole: Official

WASHINGTON, July 24 (Reuters) - The U.S. Internal Revenue Service is pursuing tax enforcement cases against companies over the issue of "stateless income," a senior agency official said on Wednesday in a reference to corporate profits that are not taxed by any country.

Erik Corwin, an IRS deputy chief counsel, said there were international tax disputes with companies, "most involving consequences of complex restructurings designed either to create stateless income or to affect a tax efficient repatriation."

U.S. Companies Lobbying Furiously To Save Corporate Tax Loopholes: Study

Corporate America worked hard to build massive loopholes into the tax code for itself, and by golly it is working just as hard to keep them.

U.S. companies, along with their lobbyists and trade groups, are treating Washington, D.C., like a big, swampy strip club, showering it with cash in an effort to fight tax reform laws that might put hundreds of billions of dollars back into government coffers. The seamy details of this lobbying effort are found in a new study by the reform advocacy group Public Citizen. It is arguably one of the least-surprising studies in the history of studies, right up there with research confirming that popes tend to wear large hats. But it makes for depressing, eye-opening reading nonetheless.

Apple's U.S. Tax Bill Over Three Years Was $8.4 Billion Lower Than The Company Told Investors: Senate Report

Apple's actual U.S. tax bill is far lower than the company tells investors, according to a Senate panel report.

The Cupertino, Calif. company under fire now for its tax strategy, paid $8.4 billion less in U.S. taxes over a three-year period than the company told investors, according to the report released earlier this week ahead of CEO Tim Cook's testimony before the Senate.

Apple Is Paying Almost No Taxes On The $102 Billion It Has Stashed Offshore: Report

Just one day before Apple's CEO Tim Cook is expected to argue for corporate tax reform on Capitol Hill, a new report claims that the company is avoiding paying taxes on billions of dollars in profits.

The U.S.-based software giant is parking $102 billion in overseas tax havens, allowing the company to pay a near zero global tax rate on that money, according to a new report from the left-leaning think tank, Citizens for Tax Justice.

Executive Pay Of Austerity Advocates Saves Companies More Than $1 Billion Via Tax Loophole

WASHINGTON -- Companies in the Fix the Debt coalition, which advocates for federal austerity policies, qualified for $1 billion or more in tax breaks tied to executive pay packages from 2009 to 2011, according to a new report by the liberal think tanks Institute for Policy Studies and Campaign for America's Future.

As Obama Confronts Corporate Tax Reform, Past Lessons Suggest Lobbyists Will Fight For Loopholes

Starbucks had already mastered the art of doing business on multiple continents as it grew from a niche coffee retailer in Seattle into a global brand with thousands of outlets from Saudi Arabia to Peru. Now the company smelled a fresh opportunity that required a presence in mysterious territory with its own unique culture: Washington, D.C.

Paul Ryan, Romney Campaign Stumble Over Questions About Which Tax Loopholes They'd Close

Mitt Romney's campaign continued its trend Monday of refusing to specify which tax loopholes he and running mate Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) would close if elected, on the same day the campaign vowed to "reinforce more specifics" regarding what a Romney presidency would look like.

The Republican presidential nominee sought to refocus the debate on the economy with the release of two new ads on Monday, after his campaign spent much of last week trying to mitigate the criticism he incited when he condemned President Barack Obama's handling of attacks on U.S. diplomatic missions in Egypt and Libya.

Loopholes And Corporate Tax Dodging Costing Developing Countries Billions: Report

It's no secret that many multinationals have become particularly adept at exploiting tax loopholes. Nor is it a surprising that the U.S. federal deficit is widening as a result. What's not as publicized, however, is that developing nations are also feeling the heat.

Developing countries have lost hundreds of billions of dollars due multinational corporations' ability to both legally and illegally avoid taxes, and a lack of adequate monitoring by regulators, according to a recent report from the European Network On Debt and Development.

Between 2005 and 2007 in sub-Saharan African countries alone, nearly $27 billion was shifted illegally due to trade mispricing -- or when companies manipulate trade access borders for profit -- the report found. But multinational corporations are also using legal means to pay less in taxes, including setting up subsidiaries and administrative units in countries with near-zero tax rates and allocating the value of what the company creates to the most favorable region.

The report mirrors others indicating that many multinational corporations are getting increasingly skilled at avoiding taxes. Nearly 300 of America's most profitable corporations paid an average tax rate of 18.5 percent between 2008 and 2010, according to an October study from Citizens for Tax Justice. That's compared to the actual corporate tax rate of 35 percent, nearly double the rate actually paid.