Financial Transparency Coalition

The Financial Accountability & Corporate Transparency (FACT) Coalition, which includes Task Force coordinating committee members Global Financial Integrity, Tax Justice Network, and Global Witness, released a document detailing their tax legislative asks yesterday. The document does a great job of detailing important ways to keep the financial system accountable, both in a domestic and international sense. The entire document can be downloaded after clicking ‘read more’ or at the ‘PDF’ link in the post title.

Here are some salient excerpts for the Task Force:

TAX REFORM

The current tax code is full of perks and preferences that create a great deal of unfairness in the tax system. Some large multinational corporations pay little or no federal income taxes, year after year, while domestic‐based businesses large and small commonly pay a quarter or even a third of their income in federal taxes. Some very wealthy taxpayers pay an effective rate almost half of that paid by middle‐income workers.

We ask Congress to enact tax reform that:

• 1. Ends Corporate Tax Deferral on Foreign Earnings and enacts a true worldwide system of taxing U.S.‐based multinational corporations. Enacts Interim Measures to curtail abuse of current system until a true worldwide system is completely phased in. Rejects a Repatriation Tax Holiday that is, in effect, an amnesty for corporations that have dodged their taxes by sending profits and jobs offshore. Rejects a Territorial System that would give multinationals a permanent zero rate on their foreign earnings.

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• 6. Improves Enforcement and Closes the “Tax Gap”
• Combats tax haven abuse
• Increases Internal Revenue Service resources
• Requires automatic tax information exchange with other countries
• Enacts country‐by‐country reporting of financial information by publicly listed companies
• Requires disclosure of the beneficial owners of all U.S. corporations
• Enacts measures requiring MORE, not less, third‐party reporting
• Enacts the Tax Lien Simplification Act
• Allows the IRS to publish a Tax Delinquents List

Learn more at fact.gfip.org.