Wednesday, September 08, 2004

Here it is...



Thought I forgot, didn't you?

Nope. There's been a Blogger-induced delay, but there's still time for another Wednesday update of the Upper Left Scandal Scorecard, and here it is.
Today's entry comes courtesy of a GAO investigation, which reports that
U.S. subsidiaries of corporations headquartered in tax haven countries such as Bermuda are likely to enjoy advantages over American companies when bidding on federal contracts, congressional auditors said Friday.

The Government Accountability Office, the investigative arm of Congress, said the subsidiaries have a "tax cost advantage" that enables them to shift income to their tax haven parent companies to reduce income subject to U.S. corporate taxes.

Because of that, they can offer lower bid prices on government contracts than their competitors, said the GAO, formerly known as the General Accounting Office.
Get that? It's not enough that companies use off-shore production to flood the US market with cheap consumer goods that undermine our production capability. Nope, they use foreign tax havens to get a competitive advantage over companies that pay American taxes, with the current US government policy rewards them for avoiding US taxes.

The Bushco response? Continuing the drive to "reform" progressivity out of the US tax code, without addressing the companies that use tax havens and outsourcing to pile up profits at the expense of the public.

Those are the corporations that John Kerry called "Benedict Arnold companies." It's a bit of rhetoric from the primaries I wouldn't mnd seeing reappear in the next few weeks.

Regardless of what you call the companies involved, the ability to exploit the federal contracting system by evading federal taxes is scandalous, and it expands the Scandal Scorecard to 58 entries - that's more than one for every day left until the election.

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