I have blogged before about the close ties between the present administration and the big banks — just search the blog for Goldman Sachs or Tim Geithner. But, what to our wondering eyes should appear but GE earning lots of money and paying ZERO US tax. According to CBS (which I admit is a questionable source for objective reporting):
In January, President Obamanamed General Electric CEO Jeffrey Immelt to head the President’s Council on Jobs and Competitiveness, an economic advisory board focused on job creation.
In his State of the Union address that same month, meanwhile, hecalled for the closure of corporate tax loopholes in conjunction with a lowering of the corporate tax rate, which stands at 35 percent.
“Over the years, a parade of lobbyists has rigged the tax code to benefit particular companies and industries,” he said. “Those with accountants or lawyers to work the system can end up paying no taxes at all. But all the rest are hit with one of the highest corporate tax rates in the world. It makes no sense. It has to change.”
Mr. Obama’s choice of Immelt came under scrutiny Friday in the wake of a front-page story in the New York Timesreporting that despite $14.2 billion in worldwide profits – including more than $5 billion from U.S. operations – GE did not owe taxes in 2010.
In fact, the story said, G.E. claimed a tax benefit of $3.2 billion.
I think that Democrats in Delaware ought to call Congressman John Carney and ask him his stance on GE’s bonanza at the expense of American jobs. It is my understanding that they attended Dartmouth together.
Now, we know from a Kauffman Foundation report issued several months back that large businesses created ZERO jobs over the last twenty years in the United States and that small business was the engine of job creation. As a matter of research, big businesses actually destroyed jobs (They buy the successful small ones and then rationalize the costs — aka trim staff). Sadly, in Delaware, the only entities that receive government largess are big businesses (who get large dollops of strategic fund money).
Democrats – the Party of Big Business.
