Taxpayers Subsidize CEO Pay, Report Says

[Bill USA]

http://news.yahoo.com/report-taxpayers-subsidize-ceo-pay-040124133--abc-news-deals.html

The Institute for Policy Studies, a self-described "progressive multi-issue think tank," analyzed the link between tax loopholes and excessive executive compensation and concluded that the loopholes created an "uneven playing field" between large companies and small businesses and led to lost tax revenue.

The latest edition ("Executive Excess 2012: The CEO Hands in Uncle Sam's Pocket&quot of the institute's annual Executive Excess compensation study found that in 2011, 26 CEOs received more in compensation than their companies paid in taxes, and that the four major tax loopholes contributing to excessive executive pay cost taxpayers about $14.4 billion a year.

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The report critiqued the major tax loopholes, including the preferential treatment of "carried interest" income for hedge fund managers. "Carried interest" income can be taxed as capital gains - at 15 percent tops - instead of at 35 percent, the top income tax rate. The Congressional Budget Office's projected estimate for "carried interest" income - revenue from investment income or dividends - for 2012 to 2021 was $21.4 billion.

Companies can deduct executive pay as a business expense, just as they do inventory and appreciation. Because of a tax rule enacted in the early 1990s that limited the amount of cash that could be deducted to $1 million, corporations have increasingly paid executives in stock options. Corporations can exempt stock option compensation, and other performance-based pay, from taxation.

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[Ruby the Liberal]

2. Back to the bridge with thee!

Have a nice day.

[PDJane]

3. And this would be a shock to anyone? Why?

The game is rigged by that bunch at the top with all the money. Money equals power in this society, and the people wielding the power don't care about the people who can't match their private school education and their ability to take money from the taxpayer. I suppose it makes sense that they don't want to pay their taxes; after all, that only takes it from one pocket to put it back in the other.