Wells Fargo Pays Less Tax Than You Do

While unrepentant silver-spoon trustafarian one-percenters like Alan Simpson keep telling the rest of us that our Grandmas must starve in the name of deficit before any rich people are forced to give their second summer homes in the Hamptons, some decent civic-minded souls are asking why Wells Fargo pays a much smaller percentage of their income in less taxes than you or I do (corrected because of the confirming information that Wells Fargo actually paid less than zero tax in recent years):

The recent Citizens for Tax Justice report, “Corporate Taxpayers & Corporate Tax Dodgers, 2008-­‐10,” lists 249
corporations that paid less than their fair share in federal corporate income taxes in 2010. In other words, 249 of the
country’s largest and most profitable corporations paid less than the U.S. statutory corporate tax rate of 35% in 2010.
Instead. these 249 companies got a 2010 federal tax subsidy totaling over $87.27 billion.
One of these corporations, Wells Fargo, got a 2010 federal tax subsidy of OVER $4.42 BILLION.
Minnesota’s share of this massive corporate tax giveaway comes to OVER $76 MILLION.

That’s $76 million that could have, had it gone into Federal coffers and then into Minnesota’s share of Federal programs, done the following in 2010:

– Provided over $8 million for Medicaid, enough for 1,100 Minnesota Medicaid recipients
– Provided over $1.5 million for anti-hunger programs, distributed as follows:
* Over $1 million in food stamp benefits (enough to feed 720 people)
* Over $160,000 in WIC benefits (enough to feed 320 low-income mothers and children)
* Over $376,000 in nutritional assistance for low-­income school-­age children (enough to provide over 288,000 meals to
over 1,510 children)

And that’s just a start.

If this sickens you as much as it does me, I suggest that you, if you’re a Minnesotan, make your voice heard at the March and Rally for the 99% in Saint Paul next Tuesday, January 24.

The event starts at 4:00 pm in front of the Wells Fargo offices at 430 Wabasha Street North; from there, the rally participants will march to 175 West Kellogg Boulevard and the St. Paul RiverCentre, wherein will be held the Minnesota Chamber of Commerce’s “2012 Session Priorities” gala where folks from Wells Fargo and other fat cats will engage in ritual back-patting and congratulations at having avoided taking up their share of the civic responsibilities we are all allotted.

More about the rally (and about Wells Fargo’s tax-dodging scumbaggery) can be found here, here, and here.

Be there and have fun!

Don’t Let This Happen

see more Lolcats and funny pictures, and check out our Socially Awkward Penguin lolz!

The blackout is over but the risk from SOPA and PIPA is still great. Protect creativity, freedom of expression, and lolcats. Tell your members of Congress to oppose SOPA/PIPA.

Friday Cat Blogging

Reflective cat reflects on life, the universe, and everything. Or maybe on his reflection.

Murdoch phone hacking scandal, 1/20/12

Dan Sabbagh and Amelia Hill, The Guardian:

Mr Justice Vos, the judge presiding over the hacking cases, told News Group Newspapers (NGN) he had seen evidence which raised “compelling questions about whether you concealed, told lies, actively tried to get off scot free”.

The judge ordered the company to search a number of computers which he said could contain evidence that its executives deliberately tried to destroy evidence of phone hacking, saying that he had seen emails which showed a “startling approach to the email record of NGN”.

He said he had seen emails that showed how, days after the actor Sienna Miller wrote to the company asking it to retain emails which might relate to hacking her phone, “a previously conceived plan to conceal evidence was put in train by NGN managers”.

See also here and Jason Deans, Amelia Hill and Lisa O’Carroll, The Guardian:

News International has agreed to pay out to 37 victims of News of the World phone hacking, including Jude Law, Lord Prescott and Ashley Cole, in a series of settlements likely to land the publisher with a bill of well over £1m.

It’s still peanuts. But maybe the lies and concealment will land them some criminal prosecutions.

Honduras, the warm-up for Michigan or Michigan, the warmup for Honduras?

Via Adrienne, Suzy Dean of the London Independent:

A worrying development in Honduras echoes anti-democratic trends in Italy and Greece, whereby technocracy is usurping popular rule.

…A year ago, the National Party, with support from the opposition Liberal Party, decided to form the Región Especial de Desarrollo (RED), or Special Development Region…..

Last month, President Lobo of Honduras established a Transparency Commission of five experts [including economist George Akerlof and Nancy Birdsall, ex-IADB, presently running the Center for Global Development] and “influential supporters in the broad community of people concerned with economic development”. This Commission will act as the guardian body of the proposed new cities, and is tasked primarily with establishing a procedure for receiving and reviewing development proposals from would-be investors, as well as ensuring that business dealings related to the RED remain open, competitive, and free of corruption.

What sets the REDs apart from other charter cities is the belief that in order for the cities to thrive they must suspend democracy. The unelected Commission will govern the new city, until they decide the population is ‘ready’ for democracy; only then will new local councils be set up.

I have discussed this point with RNS. As of about a year ago, he didn’t see the comparison, saying that Michigan “does not expropriate land or force a different form of government on the bankrupt unit,” while Honduras’ bill allows the expropriation of land, which it otherwise couldn’t legally do. Also, that Honduran citizens are making a choice to move into these new towns, while Michigan residents are already there. There certainly are differences between Michigan and Honduras, though land expropriation and forcing a different form of government on cities are not features I would choose to draw a contrast.

Dean hits the mark in saying, “The suspension of democracy is ultimately problematic because it is a prerequisite to a functioning society, not a barrier.” This is the common thread. And now Greece and Italy are seeing their own governmental powers nullified in the name of fiscal responsibility. Maybe it’s all coincidence, something that just naturally happens in financial crises. But I get very nervous when democratic mechanisms cease to function. Honduras should worry. So should Detroit. So should we all.