GOODY TWO SHOES: TARP Recipients Are Tax Dodgers
A new investigation (.pdf) by the Government Accountability Office reveals that 83 of the nation's 100 largest publicly-traded corporations, including Citigroup, Bank of America and others getting bailed out by U.S. taxpayers had subsidiaries in offshore tax havens in 2007, reports The Associated Press:
Bank of America Inc., Citigroup Inc. and Morgan Stanley all had more than 100 units in countries. The three financial institutions were included in the $700 billion financial bailout approved by Congress.
Insurance giant American International Group Inc., which has received about $150 billion in bailout money, had 18 subsidiaries. JPMorgan Chase & Co. had 50 units and Wells Fargo & Co. had 18; both financial institutions received government bailout money. …
General Motors Corp., which received $13.4 billion from the federal rescue package, had 11 offshore subsidiaries while GM's financing arm, GMAC LLC, had two offshore units. GMAC, whose majority owner is private equity firm Cerberus Capital Management LP, received $5 billion from the Treasury Department in late December.
Sens. Carl Levin (D-MI) and Byron Dorgan (D-ND) requested the report. Levin, who chairs the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations says the U.S. government is being shortchanged by $100 billion a year in lost taxes through abusive tax havens and offshore accounts.Editorial Note: With Levin making corporate tax dodgers a focus of his subcommittee’s investigative agenda, The Stiletto can’t see how he and Dorgan can follow the party line on Timothy Geithner becoming Treasury Secretary, as evidence is emerging that he not only distained to pay his own payroll and social security taxes – after repeatedly being advised to do so by his employer – but he also accepted reimbursement for those taxes that he had not, in fact, paid. This is neither an “honest” nor an “innocent” mistake.
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