Montreal Mirror: DAMN RIGHT: Too big to tax
media mentionby SCOTT SAXON
November 10, 2011
No doubt, the average person has slept better knowing that U.S. bailouts helped calm the waters stirred by American bankers flatulating in their own gilded tubs. If nothing else, the short-lived restabilizing was a convincing case for the importance of paying one’s taxes. Alas, a review of corporate tax-dodgers found at least five of the banks boosted by government monies—having already proven their disregard for fiscal responsibility and the greater good—skipped out on paying taxes altogether between 2008 and 2010.
A joint publication of Citizens for Tax Justice and the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy, the study of 280 leading U.S. corporations revealed that five TARP beneficiaries, including Wells Fargo and the parasites over at Goldman Sachs, avoided paying the government its tribute for at least one of the three years reviewed, despite enjoying healthy profits. Wells Fargo, the most profitable of the lot, reduced its 2009 tax bill from $18-billion to a more palatable nothing. A statement from Wells Fargo alleged the review took “data out of context to advance an agenda,” and insisted they do fulfill all tax obligations—a stance mimicked by the three banks that bothered responding to requests for comment.