Wisconsin companies will get stuck with higher taxes than China and Europe if the Democrats' reconciliation bill is enacted.

The Democrats' reconciliation bill will saddle Wisconsin with a combined federal-state corporate tax rate of 32.3% vs. communist China's 25%.

The bill will also put Wisconsin companies at a competitive disadvantage vs. Europe: The European average corporate tax rate is 19%.

Wisconsin is home to 8 Fortune 500 companies, which provide jobs for thousands of households.

"As the country tries to recover from a once-in-a-century pandemic, Wisconsin's congressional Democrats must explain why they want to stick residents with higher taxes than China and Europe," said Grover Norquist, president of Americans for Tax Reform.

The Democrats' $3.5 trillion bill will impose the largest tax increase since 1968.  It will raise individual income taxes, small business taxes, corporate taxes, and capital gains taxes.

If passed, the combined federal-state capital gains tax rate for Wisconsin residents would be 37.16% vs. China's 20%.

The burden of the corporate tax rate hike will be borne by workers in the form of lower wages, and by households in the form of higher prices. Higher corporate tax rates will also raise utility bills.

The non-partisan Joint Committee on Taxation recently affirmed in congressional testimony that the corporate tax rate hike will fall on "labor, laborers."

Testifying before the House Ways & Means Committee, JCT Chief of Staff Thomas A. Barthold said:

"Literature suggests that 25% of the burden of the corporate tax may be borne by labor in terms of diminished wage growth."

WATCH:

Economists across the political spectrum agree that workers bear the brunt of corporate tax increases. And 25% is on the very low end.

According to Stephen Entin of the Tax Foundation, labor (or workers) bear an estimated 70 percent of the corporate income tax. He wrote in 2017:

"Over the last few decades, economists have used empirical studies to estimate the degree to which the corporate tax falls on labor and capital, in part by noting an inverse correlation between corporate taxes and wages and employment. These studies appear to show that labor bears between 50 percent and 100 percent of the burden of the corporate income tax, with 70 percent or higher the most likely outcome."

A 2012 paper at the University of Warwick and University of Oxford found that a $1 increase in the corporate tax reduces wages by 92 cents in the long term. This study was conducted by Wiji Arulampalam, Michael P. Devereux, and Giorgia Maffini and studied over 55,000 businesses located in nine European countries over the period 1996-2003:

"We identify this direct shifting through cross-company variation in tax liabilities, conditional on value added per employee. Our central estimate is that $1 of additional tax reduces wages by 92 cents in the long run. The incidence of a $1 fall in value added is smaller, consistent with our wage bargaining model."

A 2015 study by Kevin Hassett and Aparna Mathur found that a 1 percent increase in corporate tax rates leads to a 0.5 percent decrease in wage rates. The study analyses 66 countries over 25 years and concludes that workers could see a greater reduction in wages than the federal government raises in new revenue from a corporate income tax increase:

"We find, controlling for other macroeconomic variables, that wages are significantly responsive to corporate taxation. Higher corporate tax rates depress wages. Using spatial modelling techniques, we also find that tax characteristics of neighbouring countries, whether geographic or economic, have a significant effect on domestic wages."

A 2006 study by William Randolph of the Congressional Budget Office found that 74% of the corporate tax is borne by domestic labor:

"Burdens are measured in a numerical example by substituting factor shares and output shares that are reasonable for the U.S. economy. Given those values, domestic labor bears slightly more than 70 percent of the burden of the corporate income tax."

A 2007 study by Alison Felix estimated that a 1 percentage point increase in the marginal corporate tax rate decreases annual wages by 0.7 percent. She concluded that the wage reductions are over four times the amount of collected corporate tax revenue:

"The empirical results presented here suggest that the incidence of corporate taxation is more than fully borne by labor. I estimate that a one percentage point increase in the marginal corporate tax rate decreases annual wages by 0.7 percent. The magnitude of the results predicts that the decrease in wages is more than four times the amount of the corporate tax revenue collected."

A 2012 Harvard Business Review piece by Mihir A. Desai notes that raising the corporate tax lands “straight on the back” of the American worker and will see a decline in real wages:

"Because capital is mobile, high tax rates divert investment away from the U.S. corporate sector and toward housing, noncorporate business sectors, and foreign countries. American workers need that capital to become more productive. When it’s invested elsewhere, real wages decline, and if product prices are set globally, there is no place for the corporate tax to land but straight on the back of the least-mobile factor in this setting: the American worker."

Even the left-of-center Tax Policy Center estimates that 20 percent of the burden of the corporate income tax is borne by labor:

"In calculating distributional effects, the Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center (TPC) assumes investment returns (dividends, interest, capital gains, etc.) bear 80 percent of the burden, with wages and other labor income carrying the remaining 20 percent."

"Democrats would be wise to oppose any tax increase," said Norquist.

Iowa companies will get stuck with higher taxes than China and Europe if the Democrats' reconciliation bill is enacted.

The Democrats' reconciliation bill will saddle Iowa with a combined federal-state corporate tax rate of 33.7% vs. China's 25%.

The bill will also put Iowa companies at a competitive disadvantage vs. Europe: The European average corporate tax rate is 19%.

"As the country tries to recover from a once-in-a-century pandemic, Democrat Cindy Axne must decide if she wants to stick residents with higher taxes than China and Europe," said Grover Norquist, president of Americans for Tax Reform.

The Democrats' $3.5 trillion bill will impose the largest tax increase since 1968. It will raise individual income taxes, small business taxes, corporate taxes, and capital gains taxes.

If passed, the combined federal-state capital gains tax rate for Iowa residents would be 37.62% vs. China's 20%.

The burden of the corporate tax rate hike will be borne by workers in the form of lower wages, and by households in the form of higher prices. Higher corporate tax rates will also raise utility bills.

The non-partisan Joint Committee on Taxation recently affirmed in congressional testimony that the corporate tax rate hike will fall on "labor, laborers."

Testifying before the House Ways & Means Committee, JCT Chief of Staff Thomas A. Barthold said:

"Literature suggests that 25% of the burden of the corporate tax may be borne by labor in terms of diminished wage growth."

WATCH:

Economists across the political spectrum agree that workers bear the brunt of corporate tax increases. And 25% is on the very low end.

According to Stephen Entin of the Tax Foundation, labor (or workers) bear an estimated 70 percent of the corporate income tax. He wrote in 2017:

"Over the last few decades, economists have used empirical studies to estimate the degree to which the corporate tax falls on labor and capital, in part by noting an inverse correlation between corporate taxes and wages and employment. These studies appear to show that labor bears between 50 percent and 100 percent of the burden of the corporate income tax, with 70 percent or higher the most likely outcome."

A 2012 paper at the University of Warwick and University of Oxford found that a $1 increase in the corporate tax reduces wages by 92 cents in the long term. This study was conducted by Wiji Arulampalam, Michael P. Devereux, and Giorgia Maffini and studied over 55,000 businesses located in nine European countries over the period 1996-2003:

"We identify this direct shifting through cross-company variation in tax liabilities, conditional on value added per employee. Our central estimate is that $1 of additional tax reduces wages by 92 cents in the long run. The incidence of a $1 fall in value added is smaller, consistent with our wage bargaining model."

A 2015 study by Kevin Hassett and Aparna Mathur found that a 1 percent increase in corporate tax rates leads to a 0.5 percent decrease in wage rates. The study analyses 66 countries over 25 years and concludes that workers could see a greater reduction in wages than the federal government raises in new revenue from a corporate income tax increase:

"We find, controlling for other macroeconomic variables, that wages are significantly responsive to corporate taxation. Higher corporate tax rates depress wages. Using spatial modelling techniques, we also find that tax characteristics of neighbouring countries, whether geographic or economic, have a significant effect on domestic wages."

A 2006 study by William Randolph of the Congressional Budget Office found that 74% of the corporate tax is borne by domestic labor:

"Burdens are measured in a numerical example by substituting factor shares and output shares that are reasonable for the U.S. economy. Given those values, domestic labor bears slightly more than 70 percent of the burden of the corporate income tax."

A 2007 study by Alison Felix estimated that a 1 percentage point increase in the marginal corporate tax rate decreases annual wages by 0.7 percent. She concluded that the wage reductions are over four times the amount of collected corporate tax revenue:

"The empirical results presented here suggest that the incidence of corporate taxation is more than fully borne by labor. I estimate that a one percentage point increase in the marginal corporate tax rate decreases annual wages by 0.7 percent. The magnitude of the results predicts that the decrease in wages is more than four times the amount of the corporate tax revenue collected."

A 2012 Harvard Business Review piece by Mihir A. Desai notes that raising the corporate tax lands “straight on the back” of the American worker and will see a decline in real wages:

"Because capital is mobile, high tax rates divert investment away from the U.S. corporate sector and toward housing, noncorporate business sectors, and foreign countries. American workers need that capital to become more productive. When it’s invested elsewhere, real wages decline, and if product prices are set globally, there is no place for the corporate tax to land but straight on the back of the least-mobile factor in this setting: the American worker."

Even the left-of-center Tax Policy Center estimates that 20 percent of the burden of the corporate income tax is borne by labor:

"In calculating distributional effects, the Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center (TPC) assumes investment returns (dividends, interest, capital gains, etc.) bear 80 percent of the burden, with wages and other labor income carrying the remaining 20 percent."

"Democrats would be wise to oppose any tax increase," said Norquist.

Americans for Tax Reform and a coalition of 30 conservative and free market groups and activists joined a letter in opposition to the Senate Democrat plans to pass a package of European-style antitrust regulations. Even though the left labels this effort as “antitrust reform,” these bills are hardly antitrust bills. Instead, they are regulatory bills that give Biden bureaucrats sweeping new power to reshape the economy in service of their progressive social agenda.

You can read the full letter below or here:

Dear Senator, 

Recent media reports have indicated that Senate Democrats are crafting a package of European-style antitrust regulation. 

Some left-wing politicians are attempting to convince conservatives that weaponizing antitrust law is the solution to legitimate anger over Big Tech censorship. In reality, such politicians are not acting in good faith, and these bills would increase the political and government abuse of conservatives. 

Even though the left labels this effort as “antitrust reform,” these bills are hardly antitrust bills. They are regulatory bills that give Biden bureaucrats sweeping new power to reshape the economy in service of their progressive social agenda. 

We urge you to reject any proposal that politicizes antitrust law or gives unelected bureaucrats even more power to control the economy.

The Senate legislation follows a package of six antitrust bills spearheaded by Rep. David Cicilline (D-R.I.) and reported out of the House Judiciary Committee in June.

The Cicilline package targets so-called “covered platforms” with over 50 million users and market capitalization/net sales of over $600 billion. As soon as a company has the audacity to grow larger than this government-determined size, it gets whacked with a slew of onerous new regulations.

One bill would allow the government to break up targeted companies that operate a business line that a bureaucrat deems to be a “conflict of interest.” Another would prevent targeted companies from selling or providing private-label products in their marketplaces, depriving shoppers of products they value at a lower cost than name-brand products.

An additional bill would ban targeted companies from making any new mergers and acquisitions, choking off a critical pathway to success for innovative startups. To keep track of all these new restrictions, another bill sets up secret government committees to monitor the activities of each targeted company.

Clearly, none of these bills address conservative censorship concerns. Instead, the package is a brazen power grab that gives Biden bureaucrats sweeping new authority to regulate the economy. While these bills are clearly geared towards the technology sector, the left wants to regulate every industry “from cat food to caskets.” This is just the beginning.

If these bills became law, companies fearful of abusive antitrust litigation would pull punches when competing with rival firms, robbing shoppers of the low prices and best choices that open competition delivers. Putting innovative American companies in a Mother-May-I relationship with the government would squash innovation and kill economic growth as we dig out from the pandemic.

Conservatives have long believed that antitrust law should be a scalpel used to rectify consumer harm, not a sledgehammer that bureaucrats and trial lawyers can use to advance their progressive social agenda. The left’s antitrust “reforms” would do just that.

As negotiations continue on a Senate antitrust package, we urge you to reject any legislation that politicizes antitrust law or gives the Biden administration even more power. Doing so would harm shoppers, stunt economic growth, and increase political abuse of conservatives.

Sincerely, 

Grover Norquist
President, Americans for Tax Reform

Phil Kerpen
President, American Commitment

Brent Wm. Gardner
Chief Government Affairs Officer, Americans for Prosperity

Dick Patten
President, American Business Defense Council

Kevin Waterman
Chair, Annapolis Center Right Coalition Meeting

Robert H. Bork Jr.
President, Antitrust Education Project

Jim Martin
Founder and Chairman, 60 Plus Association

Saulius “Saul” Anuzis
President, 60 Plus Association

Andrew F. Quinlan
President, Center for Freedom and Prosperity

Jessica Melugin
Director of the Center for Technology and Innovation, Competitive Enterprise Institute

Chuck Muth
President, Citizens Outreach (Nevada)

Katie McAuliffe
Executive Director, Digital Liberty

Carrie Lukas
President, Independent Women's Forum

Heather R. Higgins
CEO, Independent Women's Voice

Steve Moore
Distinguished Visiting Fellow, Institute for Economic Freedom

Tom Giovanetti
President, Institute for Policy Innovation

Dr. J. Robert McClure
President & CEO, James Madison Institute

Rodolfo E. Milani
Founder & Chairman, Miami Freedom Forum

William O’Brien
Former Speaker, NH House of Representatives
Co-chair, New Hampshire Center Right Coalition

Doug Kellogg
Executive Director, Ohioans for Tax Reform

Tom Hebert
Executive Director, Open Competition Center

Lorenzo Montanari
Executive Director, Property Rights Alliance

Wayne Brough
Director of Technology & Innovation, R Street Institute

Mike Stenhouse
CEO, Rhode Island Center for Freedom and Prosperity

Bryan Bashur
Executive Director, Shareholder Advocacy Forum

Karen Kerrigan
President & CEO, Small Business & Entrepreneurship Council

Kerri Toloczko
Chair, SWFL Center Right Coalition

Patrick Hedger
Vice President of Policy, Taxpayers Protection Alliance

Rusty Cannon
President, Utah Taxpayers Association

Casey Given
Executive Director, Young Voices

Massachusetts companies will get stuck with higher taxes than communist China if the Democrats' reconciliation bill is enacted.

The Democrats' reconciliation bill will saddle Massachusetts with a combined federal-state corporate tax rate of 32.4% vs. China's 25%.

The bill will also put Massachusetts companies at a competitive disadvantage vs. Europe: The European average corporate tax rate is 19%.

Massachusetts is home to 18 Fortune 500 companies, which provide jobs and livelihoods for tens of thousands of households in the state.

"As the country tries to recover from a once-in-a-century pandemic, Massachusetts' congressional Democrats must explain why they want to stick residents with higher taxes than China and Europe," said Grover Norquist, president of Americans for Tax Reform.

The Democrats' $3.5 trillion bill will impose the largest tax increase since 1968. It will raise individual income taxes, small business taxes, corporate taxes, and capital gains taxes.

If passed, the combined federal-state capital gains tax rate for Massachusetts residents would be 36.8% vs. China's 20%.

The burden of the corporate tax rate hike will be borne by workers in the form of lower wages, and by households in the form of higher prices. Higher corporate tax rates will also raise utility bills.

The non-partisan Joint Committee on Taxation recently affirmed in congressional testimony that the corporate tax rate hike will fall on "labor, laborers."

Testifying before the House Ways & Means Committee, JCT Chief of Staff Thomas A. Barthold said:

"Literature suggests that 25% of the burden of the corporate tax may be borne by labor in terms of diminished wage growth."

WATCH:

Economists across the political spectrum agree that workers bear the brunt of corporate tax increases. And 25% is on the very low end.

According to Stephen Entin of the Tax Foundation, labor (or workers) bear an estimated 70 percent of the corporate income tax. He wrote in 2017:

"Over the last few decades, economists have used empirical studies to estimate the degree to which the corporate tax falls on labor and capital, in part by noting an inverse correlation between corporate taxes and wages and employment. These studies appear to show that labor bears between 50 percent and 100 percent of the burden of the corporate income tax, with 70 percent or higher the most likely outcome."

A 2012 paper at the University of Warwick and University of Oxford found that a $1 increase in the corporate tax reduces wages by 92 cents in the long term. This study was conducted by Wiji Arulampalam, Michael P. Devereux, and Giorgia Maffini and studied over 55,000 businesses located in nine European countries over the period 1996-2003:

"We identify this direct shifting through cross-company variation in tax liabilities, conditional on value added per employee. Our central estimate is that $1 of additional tax reduces wages by 92 cents in the long run. The incidence of a $1 fall in value added is smaller, consistent with our wage bargaining model."

A 2015 study by Kevin Hassett and Aparna Mathur found that a 1 percent increase in corporate tax rates leads to a 0.5 percent decrease in wage rates. The study analyses 66 countries over 25 years and concludes that workers could see a greater reduction in wages than the federal government raises in new revenue from a corporate income tax increase:

"We find, controlling for other macroeconomic variables, that wages are significantly responsive to corporate taxation. Higher corporate tax rates depress wages. Using spatial modelling techniques, we also find that tax characteristics of neighbouring countries, whether geographic or economic, have a significant effect on domestic wages."

A 2006 study by William Randolph of the Congressional Budget Office found that 74% of the corporate tax is borne by domestic labor:

"Burdens are measured in a numerical example by substituting factor shares and output shares that are reasonable for the U.S. economy. Given those values, domestic labor bears slightly more than 70 percent of the burden of the corporate income tax."

A 2007 study by Alison Felix estimated that a 1 percentage point increase in the marginal corporate tax rate decreases annual wages by 0.7 percent. She concluded that the wage reductions are over four times the amount of collected corporate tax revenue:

"The empirical results presented here suggest that the incidence of corporate taxation is more than fully borne by labor. I estimate that a one percentage point increase in the marginal corporate tax rate decreases annual wages by 0.7 percent. The magnitude of the results predicts that the decrease in wages is more than four times the amount of the corporate tax revenue collected."

A 2012 Harvard Business Review piece by Mihir A. Desai notes that raising the corporate tax lands “straight on the back” of the American worker and will see a decline in real wages:

"Because capital is mobile, high tax rates divert investment away from the U.S. corporate sector and toward housing, noncorporate business sectors, and foreign countries. American workers need that capital to become more productive. When it’s invested elsewhere, real wages decline, and if product prices are set globally, there is no place for the corporate tax to land but straight on the back of the least-mobile factor in this setting: the American worker."

Even the left-of-center Tax Policy Center estimates that 20 percent of the burden of the corporate income tax is borne by labor:

"In calculating distributional effects, the Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center (TPC) assumes investment returns (dividends, interest, capital gains, etc.) bear 80 percent of the burden, with wages and other labor income carrying the remaining 20 percent."

"Democrats would be wise to oppose any tax increase," said Norquist.