Taxation is a social injustice issue:
Citizens’ groups around the world are increasingly raising concerns about the social costs that tax evasion is imposing on their societies. Offshore tax havens – commonly called offshore financial centers, or OFCs – are central to these concerns. Today there are more than seventy OFCs, many based in small island states such as the Cayman Islands and the Bahamas. OFCs levy little or no tax on income and provide few rules on incorporation. Corporations can conduct their business without having a physical presence in these jurisdictions. Most importantly, OFCs guarantee secrecy so that their clients are beyond the scrutiny of tax authorities and regulators in their home countries.
[…]
These characteristics have attracted wealthy individuals and corporations to move their assets offshore. One-third of the wealth of the world’s richest individuals, or US$11.5 trillion, is now held offshore. More than half of all global trade is conducted through OFCs, and half the world’s money supply is estimated to pass through OFCs at some point.
OFC secrecy provisions are enabling massive amounts of tax evasion; the loss in global tax revenues is now estimated to be at least $500 billion annually. Secrecy provisions also facilitate bribery, theft, insider trading, drugs and arms trafficking, and money laundering. Today an estimated $1 trillion of “dirty” money flows into OFCs each year.
[…]
Wealthy individuals are also escaping their tax obligations by holding their assets offshore. A 2006 U.S. Senate report concluded that Americans with offshore assets avoid $40 to $70 billion in taxes each year. The Tax Justice Network (UK) calculated that if the returns on $11.5 trillion of individual wealth now placed in OFCs were taxed at 30 percent, it would generate $255 billion in tax revenues globally.
For developing countries, the loss of tax revenues of at least $50 billion annually has been disastrous. In addition, an estimated $148 billion of illegal capital flight leaves the African continent every year. This loss of tax revenues along with illegal capital flight has resulted in the deaths of thousands of vulnerable people as health services have been dismantled and public infrastructure crumbled. However, the role of OFCs in enabling tax evasion and illegal capital flight is rarely considered in debates about Third World poverty.
Someone should ask Barack Obama what he plans to do about this. And remember this:
Bill Clinton gave the super rich, the 400 highest income people in America a big tax cut. They were paying 30 cents out of each dollar of their income to the federal government when he came into the office. When he left, it was down to 22. Bush has lowered it to 17. Now, first of all, notice you’re probably paying more than 17 cents. May well be paying more than 22. But Bush gave them an eight cent tax cut– I’m sorry. Clinton gave an eight cent tax cut and Bush only gave them five cents.
These people already have numerous available methods of tax evasion. So Clinton and Bush give them the added advantage of tax cuts. Aaaaand …
mirabile dictu 