14/05/21

US: Axne seeks crackdown on corporations' offshore tax havens.

As published on kmaland.com, Thursday 13 May, 2021.

(Washington) -- Iowa Congresswoman Cindy Axne is among those backing a bill that would require big corporations to disclose financial and job reporting on a country-by-country basis.

On Wednesday, the U.S. House Financial Services Corporation approved the Disclosure of Tax Havens and Offshoring Act. Axne and Maryland Congresswoman Chris Van Houten introduced the measure earlier this month. Speaking on KMA's "Morning Line" program Thursday morning, Axne says the bill is designed to provide investors and the public transparency on how corporations use tax havens in the offshoring of American jobs.

"In 2017, U.S. corporations booked $32 billion of profits in Bermuda," said Axne, "despite only having 547 employees there. That's something like an efficiency rate of $130 million per employee. Come on--I know Iowans are efficient when it comes to work. That's crazy. So, what's happened here is that $32 billion in profits that's been offshored--they're not paying taxes on that."

The West Des Moines Democrat says multibillion dollar corporations are shifting profits and jobs overseas, thus avoiding paying U.S. taxes. She says that has a negative impact on Iowa's smaller businesses.

"In essence, they're doing everything they can to make it harder for our small businesses to get ahead," said Axne. "This, to me, impacts Iowa's small businesses, because we're at a disadvantage as large multinational corporations who are shifting those profits around and avoiding taxes, while our main street businesses are paying their taxes, and struggling to make ends meet."

The bill directs the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission to mandate large companies to disclosure financial filings that they already provide to the IRS on an annual basis.

"It would require public companies to disclose information on a country-by-country basis about their operations," said Axne, "which include their revenues, their profits, their employees, their taxes paid, etcetera, so that investors and the public can have more information on what they're doing. Once you disclose this, there is an obvious understanding in how much money we're missing out in taxes because businesses are taking advantage of opportunities that the everyday Iowan, everyday American doesn't even know about, or even have a chance to do."