We’re told billionaire tax avoidance is ‘perfectly legal’. But is it?
David Sirota
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/jun/23/billionaire-tax-avoidance-perfectly-legal
A presumption of innocence is never afforded to poor people accused of petty theft. Yet billionaires benefit from it every day when it comes to taxes
In the wake of ProPublica’s recent disclosure of how billionaires avoid income taxes, a narrative has been manufactured: we are told that while the moguls’ schemes to reduce tax liability may be immoral, the tactics are all “perfectly legal”, in the words of ProPublica, an idea that was then echoed by the Associated Press, the New York Times and the pundit world.
This conventional wisdom – depicted as unquestionable fact throughout corporate media – is held up as don’t-hate-the-player-hate-the-game proof that we should be angry only at the tax system, but not necessarily at the oligarchs getting rich off it. In fact, the only person so far presumed to be worthy of any law enforcement scrutiny is not any of the billionaires avoiding taxes, but the whistleblowing source of the IRS leak.
But ask yourself: why does anyone make such charitable assumptions about the supposed legality of billionaires’ tax tactics? Such assumptions, in fact, reflect deep bias and privilege by the people making them.
Let’s stipulate that much of what is legal – tax loopholes, deductions, and other shady schemes – is a huge, scandalous problem.
Let’s also acknowledge that billionaires have armies of lawyers and accountants to devise tax circumvention schemes that adhere to the letter (though not the spirit) of the law, allowing them to pay a pittance in taxes compared to the riches they’re reaping, as ProPublica documented.
However, an appropriate legal presumption of innocence is a far cry from what’s happening here. Over the last few weeks, we have witnessed a blanket assumption that billionaires would never even attempt to stretch or violate the rules. We are led to believe that when it comes to taxes, what tycoons, aristocrats, scions and Masters of the Universe do is not merely permissible, but perfectly legal – as in the rules are not merely followed, but deeply respected.
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It is a familiar benefit of the doubt: billionaires may give a lot of cash to politicians, but they are hardly ever reported on as if they are explicitly corrupt. They may leverage their philanthropic empires to boost their business interests, but they are almost never depicted as crooked. They may pay a lower tax rate than everyone else, but they are rarely depicted by the media as outright scofflaws. Instead, we get a lot of talk about this being “just the way things work”.
Please understand that I am not accusing Jeff Bezos, Elon Musk, Warren Buffett or anyone else of actually committing crimes – if I was, an army of attorneys and PR flacks would already be knocking down my door.
I am simply pointing out that in the same political arena where the indigent are regularly tried and convicted in the press, few are daring to even consider that anything slightly shady might go down on billionaires’ tax returns. Few are daring to ask how many of these schemes existed in the gray area between legal tax avoidance and impermissible tax evasion. Even fewer are suggesting the findings should prompt any kind of government investigation of sophisticated tax shelters and circumvention tactics.