Wednesday, August 31, 2011

US rewards tax avoidance more than innovation

In a free enterprise system, companies are rewarded for making products that people want to buy. In a liberal/progressive system, companies are rewarded instead for their skills at manipulating complex government rules and regulations. A new study from the Institute for Policy Studies finds that the US has the latter system. The New York Times reports:

The authors of the study, which examined the regulatory filings of the 100 companies with the best-paid chief executives, said that their findings suggested that current United States policy was rewarding tax avoidance rather than innovation.

“We have no evidence that C.E.O.’s are fashioning, with their executive leadership, more effective and efficient enterprises,” the study concluded. “On the other hand, ample evidence suggests that C.E.O.’s and their corporations are expending considerably more energy on avoiding taxes than perhaps ever before — at a time when the federal government desperately needs more revenue to maintain basic services for the American people.” [Emph. added]

The self-contradictions of the last paragraph above shows the left/liberal bias of the Institute for Policy Studies.  (Reducing unnecessary costs, such as taxes, does in fact make an enterprise "more effective and efficient.")  It is interesting that, despite this bias, they still understand that our left/liberal tax system is sapping American productivity.

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