The Daily Review: An Overlooked Source of Revenue
media mention“Editorial, May 18, 2014
Faced with growing budget deficit partially of its own making, the Corbett administration likely will retreat from its previously planned 3.7 percent increase in state spending this election year and move instead to cut about $800 million from its tentative budget proposal.
It’s not yet known whether that will mean a reversal of the governor’s plan to restore some of the education cuts from his first three years in office. It is virtually certain that the governor will not seek to increase revenue, however.
Gov. Tom Corbett and legislators should take a new look at a corporate taxation study that was issued in March, where they might find tax revenue hiding in plain sight.
The Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy and Citizens for Tax Justice conducted the nationwide study of corporate tax avoidance. They looked at 269 Fortune 500 companies, including 16 based in Pennsylvania, that were profitable every year from 2008 through 2012. Among those, 90 avoided paying any state corporate income taxes in at least one year, 38 avoided doing so in at least two years and the total state tax avoidance for all of the companies over the period was $73.1 billion.”