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At a Senate committee hearing on Tuesday, federal lawmakers hauled in America’s most successful corporation to investigate why it had so precisely followed the laws those solons have passed. The targeting of Apple should be no particular surprise, in Congress’s crass calculus: True, even if reducing one’s tax burden and shifting profits overseas were a crime, Apple would probably not be the first company to investigate for such behavior — as chief executive Tim Cook pointed out, Apple paid $6 billion in corporate-income taxes to the U.S. Treasury in 2012, which is enough to run the entire Transportation Security Administration...

Texas outperformed every other state in the nation on jobs and growth over the past decade, according to the latest annual report on state economic performance released Thursday by the American Legislative Exchange Council. Michigan came in dead last. The rankings are based on state GDP growth, population shifts, and changes in non-farm payroll jobs between 2001 and 2011. The ALEC report also finds that Utah has the best economic outlook this year, and Vermont the worst.

  The European Parliament met Tuesday to discuss the issue of tax evasion throughout the UK and the Eurozone, and how the European Parliament might clamp down on those attempting to protect their well earned wealth from government confiscation.    All was going according to plan, until UKIP member Nigel Farage was given the floor.    Farage immediately launched into a classic rant against Barroso and the rest of the EU bureaucrats, stating that it is not the average man on the street that is engaging in tax fraud, but the European Parliament members themselves:    If we look at the...

You know you are a serious societal pestilence when even politicians can kick you around. Which is why the Senate Finance Committee called Steven Miller, former acting IRS commissioner, to testify about the agency’s scheme targeting conservatives for tax punishment. Right away, Mr. Miller got down to the business of reminding everyone why we all hate the IRS so much. “Unfortunately, given time considerations,” he began, “the IRS was unable to prepare written testimony.” Given time considerations? Unable to prepare? Are you kidding us? Have you ever heard of April 15? Can you imagine if we called up the IRS...

Florida Governor Rick Scott is cutting taxes again, this time reauthorizing the popular school sales tax holiday. According to the AP, Scott “signed into law a bill reauthorizing the states “popular back-to-school sales tax holiday” which now includes new computers. The 6% tax reprieve for shoppers, which will take place Aug2-4, is for the purchase of clothing worth $75 or less, and for school supplies, like pencils, paper, etc., that are worth $15 or less. The new computer tax relief component of the law applies to new computers, including laptops, ipads, and other electronics “readers,” as long as they cost...

Apple made business decisions that saved it billions in taxes. What was so illegal about doing such a thing? Nothing, absolutely nothing, but don't tell that to the Democrats...

Apple's Bite Apple and its CEO Tim Cook are making history, superseding very serious Administration scandals from the MSM’s consciousness and from the front pages, as they endure a very public assault by Congress for having obeyed corporate and tax laws of the countries in which they conduct business. For decades international corporations have used all tools available to them which might strengthen their business, their health, their market penetration, and their profitability.  For decades most corporations, even small companies, when licensing intellectual property, have followed the rules Congress established, just as Apple has done.  Now, Congress, led by Sen....

In our age of sclerotic growth and sprawling, dysfunctional government, Apple, Inc., represents an astonishing success story. Since its nadir in 1997, the company has increased in value by 6,413 percent. Today Apple, which is estimated to have created around 600,000 jobs, is worth more than the entire American aircraft-carrier fleet. They’re good for the government, too: “To our knowledge Apple is the largest corporate taxpayer in America,” CEO Tim Cook noted yesterday morning. “We paid $6 billion in cash to the U.S. Treasury [in 2012] — that’s $16 million each day. And we expect to pay even more this...

Although sequestration’s spending cuts grab headlines, the tax hikes are having greater fiscal effect. Unlike the much-mentioned March 1, sequester, the tax hikes began January 1, and are permanent. The disparate impacts and disproportional reaction have everything to do with Washington’s entitlement culture – that Washington feels entitled to tax and spend. Washington began this year by definitively breaking with its recession mindset. Until then, the ostensible focus had been on protecting the economic recovery, regardless of budgetary impact. For this reason, the Bush tax cuts, which liberals had always vehemently opposed, had been extended and a 2% payroll tax...

Tim Cook, Apple’s chief executive, and Peter Oppenheimer, chief financial officer, are expected to testify before the U.S. Senate Permanent Subcommittee today to dispute the findings of a new Senate report on its tax strategies. A new Senate report alleges that Apple (AAPL) blows through a loophole that capitalizes on the difference between U.S. and Irish rules regarding tax residency to avoid paying corporate income taxes. The report says the move let Apple shift at least $74 billion away from the Internal Revenue Service between 2009 and 2012. The report also alleges that Apple uses shell operations in Ireland to...

CARSON CITY — Perhaps nobody at the Legislature this year has been more insistent than Nevada Senate Majority Leader Mo Denis that the state must immediately put more money into Nevada’s education system. And Republican Gov. Brian Sandoval could hardly have been more clear when he said he opposes and would veto Denis’ bill to increase payroll taxes for education. But Denis will make the case today that his payroll tax hike proposal is the best way to help Nevada’s schools next school year. Noting that Nevada consistently ranks near the bottom of state-by-state education comparisons, the Las Vegas Democrat...

Kentucky Senator Rand Paul went on a great rant during today's Senate subcommittee hearing on Apple's offshore tax practices, slamming his Congressional colleagues for even holding the hearing in the first place. "Frankly, I'm offended by the tone and tenor of this hearing," Paul said, laying into those who take issue with Apple's tax policies. "I'm offended by the spectacle of dragging in executives from an American company that is not doing anything illegal," he added. "If anyone should be on trial, it should be Congress." Apple CEO Tim Cook is testifying before the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations this...

S. 122: Fair Tax Act of 2013 Summary: A bill to promote freedom, fairness, and economic opportunity by repealing the income tax and other taxes, abolishing the Internal Revenue Service, and enacting a national sales tax to be administered primarily by the States. More info ... http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bill.xpd?bill=s113-122 93% support out of 836 votes as of this post.

A tax bill that would raise revenue $2.1 billion by boosting taxes on high-wage earners, smokers and corporations is headed for debate by the Senate. The bill, which also helps support a development plan pushed by the Mayo Clinic in Rochester officials say could bring thousands of jobs to Minnesota, is expected to be on the agenda once state Senators return to chambers at 11 a.m. The bill passed the state House by a 69-65 vote early Monday morning, May 20. It is one of the last major tax and spending bills the Legislature is taking up as it finalizes...

Apple Inc. paid little to no corporate income tax to any national government on tens of billions of dollars in overseas income over the past four years, Senate investigators found, a revelation that fuels the debate over whether the U.S. tax code needs an overhaul. The disclosure follows a lengthy examination of the technology giant's tax practices by the U.S. Senate's Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, which is expected to air its findings at a hearing on Tuesday. Apple Chief Executive Tim Cook is preparing to testify at the hearing, and is expected to propose changes to a tax code that...

Government Overreach: The Internal Revenue Service official in charge of tax-exempt organizations when the unit targeted Tea Party groups now runs the IRS office responsible for enforcing ObamaCare. As bad as the IRS scandal was, with the taxing body of government using its unequaled authority to intimidate and harass the president's political opposition to aid his re-election, it got worse with the news that the IRS official, Sarah Hall Ingram, who served as commissioner of the Tax-Exempt and Government Entities Division from 2009 to 2012, is now serving as director of the IRS' Affordable Care Act division. Ingram was so...

Republicans Are Ripping The White House's Dan Pfeiffer For Saying The Legality Of IRS Targeting Is 'Irrelevant' Brett LoGiurato | May 19, 2013 Republicans are ripping White House senior adviser Dan Pfeiffer this morning for referring to the legality of the IRS' inappropriate targeting of conservative groups as "irrelevant." But Pfeiffer said that to reinforce the White House's assertion that the IRS' behavior is inexcusable. "I can’t speak to the law here. The law is irrelevant," Pfeiffer said on ABC's "This Week,"

The Internal Revenue Service scandal may be the worst of all the current Obama administration fiascoes. It is an easily understood gross misuse of the powers of government to target opponents of the president. What is more, the administration’s supplicants in the lefty punditocracy can no longer claim this is just an IRS scandal. The Post reports: J. Russell George, the Treasury Department’s top tax watchdog, said Friday he had informed top Treasury officials starting last spring about problems related to the special attention the agency was paying some conservative organizations seeking tax-exempt status. George said he shared the information...

"More than 8,000 French households' tax bills topped 100 percent of their income last year, the business newspaper Les Echos reported on Saturday, citing Finance Ministry data."

Breathing Emission Particles Turns HDL Cholesterol From 'Good' To 'Bad' Article Date: 18 May 2013 Academic researchers have found that breathing motor vehicle emissions triggers a change in high-density lipoprotein (HDL) cholesterol, altering its cardiovascular protective qualities so that it actually contributes to clogged arteries. In addition to changing HDL from "good" to "bad," the inhalation of emissions activates other components of oxidation, the early cell and tissue damage that causes inflammation, leading to hardening of the arteries, according to the research team, which included scientists from UCLA and other institutions. The findings of this early study, done in mice,...

French president Francois has had enough of austerity but claims he "cannot do it alone". The Financial Times reports François Hollande goes on ‘offensive’ over stalled EU economy. François Hollande promised an “offensive� to bring “more growth and less austerity� to Europe as he launched a bid to resurrect his presidency. Mr Hollande said the first priority of his second-year “offensive� was a four-point plan to “get Europe out of its torpor� – concentrating on combating youth unemployment and a strategy of investment. “The number one objective is changing Europe’s direction to have more growth and less austerity,� he said....

A FORMER Google executive has blown the whistle on a massive and “immoral” tax avoidance scheme that has “cheated” British taxpayers out of hundreds of millions of pounds over the past decade. Barney Jones, 34, who worked for the internet search giant between 2002 and 2006, has lifted the lid on an elaborate structure which diverts British profits through Ireland to the Bermuda tax haven. Although Google’s London sales staff would negotiate and sign contracts with British customers, and cash was paid into a UK bank account, deals were technically booked through its Dublin office to minimise its liabilities here....

More than 8,000 French households' tax bills topped 100 percent of their income last year, the business newspaper Les Echos reported on Saturday, citing Finance Ministry data. The newspaper said that the exceptionally high level of taxation was due to a one-off levy last year on 2011 incomes for households with assets of more than 1.3 million euros ($1.67 million). President Francois Hollande's Socialist government imposed the tax surcharge last year, shortly after taking office, to offset the impact of a rebate scheme created by its conservative predecessor to cap an individual's overall taxation at 50 percent of income. The...

On Friday, former acting IRS Commissioner Steve Miller, testifying before the House Ways and Means Committee, said that America’s tax system is “voluntary.” Rep. Xavier Becerra (D-CA) agreed. Miller offered this perspective as he was grilled about his involvement in the IRS scandal wherein the IRS targeted conservative groups, particularly Tea Party organizations. This line has been used before by none other than Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid. Interviewed by Jan Helfeld in 2008, this is how the conversation went: Helfeld: If the government is in the business of forcefully taking money from some people in order to provide welfare...

Treasury Secretary Jack Lew on Friday urged congressional leaders to raise the debt limit and insisted that the White House is not going to negotiate over the increase because lawmakers have "no choice." "We will not negotiate over the debt limit," Lew wrote. "The creditworthiness of the United States is non-negotiable. The question of whether the country must pay obligations it has already incurred is not open to debate." Lew said that while President Obama is willing to discuss plans to reduce the nation's deficit with Congress, those talks must be kept separate from any effort to raise the nation's...

I got to thinking about all this tax talk on another thread and I wondered ... what do we need taxes FOR in the first place ...

RUSH: Let's go back to the Grooveyard of Forgotten Favorites, the archives. Here's Ken Rogulski, our man in Detroit at WJR, our blowtorch affiliate there. In October 2009, people were in line for money from Obama's stimulus, and Ken Rogulski went out and talked to 'em. ROGULSKI: Why are you here? WOMAN #1: To get some money. ROGULSKI: What kind of money? WOMAN #1: Obama money. ROGULSKI: Where's it coming from? WOMAN #1: Obama. ROGULSKI: And where did Obama get it? WOMAN #1: I don't know, his stash. I don't know. (laughter) I don't know where he got it from,...

Speaking at Ohio State University earlier this month, Barack Obama urged students to pay no attention to those paranoid types who “incessantly warn of government as nothing more than some separate, sinister entity.” Oddly enough, in recent days the most compelling testimony for this view of government has come from the president himself, who insists with a straight face that he had no idea that the Internal Revenue Service had spent two years targeting his political enemies until he “learned about it from the same news reports that I think most people learned about this.” Like you, all he knows...

Speaking at Ohio State University this month, Barack Obama urged students to pay no attention to those paranoid types who "incessantly warn of government as nothing more than some separate, sinister entity." Oddly enough, in recent days the most compelling testimony for this view of government has come from the president himself, who insists, with a straight face, that he had no idea that the Internal Revenue Service had spent two years targeting his political enemies until he "learned about it from the same news reports that I think most people learned about this." Like you, all he knows is...

Among the criticisms leveled at the new Senate immigration bill is the secretive manner in which it was written. And given the details, it's hardly any wonder that the eight senators overseeing the proceedings - the "Gang of Eight" - refused to hold hearings or debate until after the bill's release. Tucked away in the measure are two sections that would route a combined $150 million or more to "public or private, non-profit organizations" that are "community, faith-based or other immigrant-serving." Recipient groups could use funds to aid potentially tens of millions of illegal immigrants and family members to obtain...

Florida Gov. Rick Scott, who has made job creation his top priority since coming into office, has rejected a proposed deal to bring major Internet retailer Amazon to the state. After months of behind-the-scenes negotiations, Scott ultimately said no to a deal that would have led to the construction of at least one Amazon warehouse in the state and brought jobs along with it. Amazon's arrival in the state, however, would have meant that Floridians would have to pay sales tax on Internet purchases made through the company.

The State Department, under Secretary Hillary Rodham Clinton, created an arrangement for her longtime aide and confidante Huma Abedin to work for private clients as a consultant while serving as a top adviser in the department. Connect with NYTMetro Follow us on Twitter and like us on Facebook for news and conversation. Ms. Abedin did not disclose the arrangement — or how much income she earned — on her financial report. It requires officials to make public any significant sources of income. The disclosure of the agreement that Ms. Abedin made with the State Department comes as her husband, former...

It’s a popular saying for many: "Tax cuts don’t create jobs." Google it, and there are more than 100,000 results for that specific claim. At this point, it is a truism for liberal politicians and commentators that tax cuts are ineffective. In 2010, Gov. Rick Snyder ran a campaign around getting rid of the hated Michigan Business Tax, which was one of the first things accomplished by the new Legislature. The change overwhelmingly helped small businesses while shifting larger corporations to a much less complicated 6 percent flat tax. The result was a $1.7 billion business tax cut. Here are...

In about 9 months, Americans will come face to face with ObamaCare. It will happen when they sit down to fill out their tax returns. My guess is that most people will be angry. ObamaCare and the IRS will work hand in hand in the implementation of the law, as Byron York points out today: "A look at the text of the health care law reveals that much of it consists of amending the Internal Revenue Code to give the IRS more power. When Obamacare goes fully into effect in January, every American will have to prove to the IRS...

President Obama a few months ago signed a bill to increase taxes by $600 billion. The title of the bill is the American Taxpayer Relief Act. As for the fourth word of that title, if you’re Obama, apparently you spell “relief” as follows: T-A-X-I-N-C-R-E-A-S-E. The president thereby achieved his goal of transferring more money away from the people who earned it with their labor over a lifetime and into the hands of people who earned it with their votes in November. As he relieved the former of the burden of their money, he thanked them: “I just want to thank...

Franklin Graham calls IRS probe of ministry finances ‘un-American’ Adelle M. Banks | May 15, 2013 (RNS) Evangelist Franklin Graham blasted the Internal Revenue Service probe of conservative nonprofit groups as “un-American,” saying both the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association and the relief group Samaritan’s Purse were audited by the IRS. In a Tuesday (May 14) letter to President Obama, Graham said the two organizations he leads were notified last September that the IRS would review their records for the 2010 tax year. The IRS inquiry, he noted, occurred months after the BGEA ran ads in April 2012 supporting a North...

Thursday, May 16, 2013 May 16, 2013 Another IRS scandal: agents illegally seized 60 million medical records Image009And as if there's not already an abundance of problems at the IRS, another one erupts, involving 60 million private medical records of 10 million patients - including all California state judges - from Healthcare IT News: The Internal Revenue Service is now facing a class action lawsuit over allegations that it improperly accessed and stole the health records of some 10 million Americans, including medical records of all California state judges. According to a report by Courthousenews.com, an unnamed HIPAA-covered entity in...

Scandal: Senate Democrats, including supporters of the Disclose Act, provided the names of groups they wanted targeted in a taxpayer-funded witch hunt overseen by an IRS employee and Obama campaign donor. Using the Citizens United case as a pretext, retiring Sen. Carl Levin, D-Mich., on July 27, 2012, wrote IRS Commissioner Douglas Shulman to investigate 12 conservative groups he accused of violating their tax-exempt status and engaging in coordinated political activity. The groups Levin asked to be targeted for special scrutiny were Crossroads Grassroots Policy Strategies, Priorities U.S.A., Americans Elect, American Action Network, Americans for Prosperity, American Future Fund, Americans...

With Obama’s IRS scandal mushrooming by the day, we’ve been learning that some applications for 501(c)(4) status have languished for years and while some targeted groups have simply given up since delays were so long. Yet curiously, some groups favorable to Obama or actually run by an Obama have been mysteriously sped up through the process. Lois Lerner, the senior IRS official at the center of the decision to target tea party groups for burdensome tax scrutiny, signed paperwork granting tax-exempt status to the Barack H. Obama Foundation, a shady charity headed by the president’s half-brother that operated illegally for...

Tuesday, May 14, 2013 Did Obama's IRS also harass pro-life groups? WASHINGTON - With the revelation that the Obama Administration's Internal Revenue Service harassed and beleaguered groups seeking tax exemption status if their names included "Tea Party" or "Patriots," and then later admitting they targeted groups with purposes of promoting limited government and other conservative missions, questions are being raised about other targeted groups. Were pro-life groups also a target of the staunchly pro-abortion Obama Administration? Chicago's Thomas More Society reported first dealing with IRS concerns from pro-life groups as early as 2009. When the Coalition for Life of Iowa...

Tax Abuse: As nonconservative groups complain of politically motivated targeting by the IRS, we're reminded it's the IRS that's going to be enforcing one of the greatest expansions of government power in our history. In recent days we've come to know what is meant by the adage that the power to tax is the power to destroy. Our country was born in revolt against taxation used by a tyrant to control and stifle liberty, and this is not the first president to abuse this power. Back in May 2009, Professor Glenn Reynolds, better known to his followers as Instapundit, wrote...

Joe Biden endorses a tax on blood and goreTaking legal advice from Joe Biden is dangerous, like taking his tips on home defense. The vice president who urges the ladies to deal with intruders by firing a shotgun at the dark now says there’s no “legal problem” with imposing a violence tax on movies and video games. Mr. Biden endorsed the idea, proposed by the Rev. Franklin Graham at a White House meeting to plot strategy for enacting the president’s gun legislation. A sin tax would be imposed on video games such as “Call of Duty” and movies such “Django...

On March 22, 2012, IRS commissioner Douglas Shulman testified under oath before the House Oversight Committee, which was inquiring as to whether the agency was targeting tea-party groups and other conservative organizations filing for tax-exempt status. He firmly and repeatedly denied that any such thing was happening. “There’s absolutely no targeting,” he said. A little over a year later, the IRS confirmed that it was in fact improperly targeting not only tea-party groups but also Jewish religious nonprofits and organizations inspired by Glenn Beck’s 9/12 Project. Lori Lerner, the IRS official in charge of tax-exempt organizations, told reporters on Friday...

Dan from Squirrel Hill's Blog President Obama refuses to fire IRS employees who illegally targeted conservative groups In May 2013, the Washington Post reported that the IRS had illegally targeted conservative groups for additional reviews. Organizations with the words “tea party� or “patriot� were singled out for harassment, such as requiring them to provide a list of donors, details about their internet postings on social networking websites, and information about their family members.When this was first reported by the media in May 2013, Lois Lerner, who heads the IRS division that had conducted these illegal activities, claimed that only low level...

A timeline of Internal Revenue Service activities that was developed by the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration and provided to congressional staff indicates that early last year—as the nation was headed toward a presidential election—the IRS issued a “be on the lookout order” (BOLO) for officials in its “Determinations Unit” to ferret out for heightened scrutiny organizations applying for tax exempt status that were involved in educating Americans “on the Constitution and Bill of Rights.” The inspector general’s timeline indicates that as early as March 2010 the IRS’ “Determinations Unit” had begun targeting for special scrutiny organizations that used...

The Internal Revenue Service's scrutiny of conservative groups went beyond those with "tea party" or "patriot" in their names—as the agency admitted Friday—to also include ones worried about government spending, debt or taxes, and even ones that lobbied to "make America a better place to live," according to new details of a government probe. The investigation also revealed that a high-ranking IRS official knew as early as mid-2011 that conservative groups were being inappropriately targeted—nearly a year before then-IRS Commissioner Douglas Shulman told a congressional committee the agency wasn't targeting conservative groups.

I’ve been wondering how the IRS was going to determine whether taxpayers were complying with the individual mandate contained in Obamacare. I needn’t have wondered. The IRS is a bureaucracy and what do bureaucracies adore almost as much as taxpayer-financed trips to Vegas for conferences? Forms, of course. When Obamacare’s individual mandate takes effect in 2014, all Americans who file income tax returns must complete an additional IRS tax form. The new form will require disclosure of a taxpayer’s personal identifying health information in order to determine compliance with the Affordable Care Act’s individual mandate. As confirmed by IRS testimony...

THE capital is in the throes of déjà vu and preview as it plunges back into Clinton Rules, defined by a presidential aide on the hit ABC show “Scandal” as damage control that goes like this: “It’s not true, it’s not true, it’s not true, it’s old news.” The conservatives appearing on Benghazi-obsessed Fox News are a damage patrol with an approach that goes like this: “Lies, paranoia, subpoena, impeach, Watergate, Iran-contra.” (Though now that the I.R.S. has confessed to targeting Tea Party groups, maybe some of the paranoia is justified.) Welcome to a glorious spring weekend of accusation and...

The Mini-Golf Tax. The “Iron Man” Tax. The Burning Man Tax. I’m pretty sure most Nevadans enjoy one or more of those activities, which means if Democrats in the Legislature pass their new Nevada Entertainment and Admissions Tax, every Nevadan will curse them when they try to enjoy themselves on the weekend after a long workweek. Wow, this is stupid. So, instead of imposing a corporate tax on Wal-Mart like nearly every other state in the country, you’re going to tax me when I go to the movie theater? So I’ll pay $11.88 instead of $11? I love carrying 12...

I’ve written many times about how investors, entrepreneurs, small business owners and other successful people migrate from high-tax states to low-tax states. Well, the same thing happens internationally, as France’s greedy politicians are now learning. It’s a lot harder for Americans to escape our tax system, though, in part because of reprehensible exit taxes that are disturbingly reminiscent of some of the awful policies of past totalitarian regimes. But it still happens, and that’s a very damning indictment of Obamanomics and a worrying referendum on the future of the United States. Here are some blurbs from a recent Fortune article....