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"Bermuda Project" to stop offshore tax expatriation

 
 
Reply Mon 14 Apr, 2003 05:50 pm
Citizen Works - 4/14/03
Fighting Back

“The Bermuda Project” aims to pressure Congress into stopping offshore tax expatriation

Columnist Arianna Huffington, working with Moveon.org, Working Assets, the Institute for America’s Future, and several other nonprofits, last week launched “The Bermuda Project,” a campaign to pressure Congress into closing the loophole that allows U.S. corporations to move their headquarters to offshore tax havens to save potentially hundreds of millions of dollars on taxes.

Huffington and others are putting their focus on getting a floor vote on the Corporate Patriot Enforcement Act, which essentially denies tax benefits to companies that reincorporate in offshore tax havens. The bill, introduced by Rep. Richard Neal (D-Mass.) as HR 737 has 152 co-sponsors, but remains stuck in the Ways and Means Committee, where Chairman Bill Thomas (R-Calif.) does not seem likely to bring it up. So the Bermuda Project is calling on the House leadership, Speaker Dennis Hastert and Republican Leader Tom Delay to bring the legislation to the floor for a vote. The companion bill in the Senate, introduced by minority Whip Harry Reid (D-Nev.) is S. 384.

The Bermuda Project has also produced a television commercial that juxtaposes images of soldiers fighting a war with those of greedy executives. “In the sands of Iraq, our soldiers risk their life for our country,” the voiceover says. “At the same time, big corporations are abandoning our country and setting up phony tax shelters in the sands of Bermuda.”

For more information, visit the Bermuda Project at http://www.thebermudaproject.com

For more information on tax traitors (including an informative tax sheet to distribute for Tax Day), see http://www.citizenworks.org/corp/tax/corp_tax_dodgers.php .
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Type: Discussion • Score: 1 • Views: 2,336 • Replies: 5
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jespah
 
  1  
Reply Tue 15 Apr, 2003 10:12 am
Let me see if I understand this (sorry, haven't had the time to read the article yet) -

Congress is looking for a way to prevent companies from incorporating outside the US. Can't companies have their home offices anywhere in the world? What's to stop a company (assuming this becomes law) from saying, "this is too much trouble; let's just take everything to China [or wherever]". After all, they can still sell here, and will. They can still put branch offices and factories here (just like Audi, etc. does), and probably will. What's the advantage to a company to keeping their incorporating in America?
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Bermuda
 
  1  
Reply Wed 16 Apr, 2003 08:09 pm
Bermuda Project
Bermuda has been a staunch ally of the United States for over 300 years.
Bermuda has been a success story for many years with an excellent record of democracy (without any prompting from the US....dare I add)
This dependant territory of the UK, another staunch ally of yours, runs its affairs properly and responsibly. This cause is unfortunate because it does not consider all the facts.
It is a pity that you spend time trying to run your friends down, without trying to find out the real facts, and then expect us to support you in time of need. "You are either with us...or not with us" to paraphrase.
I suggest that you might like to start by reading an article in the Bermuda newspaper called The Royal Gazette on www.theroyalgazette.com (go to the business pages and search for an article of April 15th 2003 entitled "For the 100th time, we are not a tax haven")
I am a very frustrated non-American friend of the US who tries very hard to understand why in the United States you feel that it is necessary to try to destroy the fabric of my country without trying to understand how it works.
We are a peaceful community just 700 miles off your shores. Unlike many countries you have had no trouble from us, you have had only friendship and support. Not one penny, say again, not one penny, of foreign aid have we ever requested, or needed, from the US for over 300 years.

Of the past....you probably are not aware that in the War of Independence you received tangible support from the people of Bermuda, this even whilst we were ruled by London. Before that time are you aware that it was food sent by Bermuda that saved the fledgling Virginia settlements from starvation?

Of the immediate past....US bases and personnel were welcomed on our shores for 50 years from 1945 to 1995 without one case of rancour that the US suffered even in the countries supposedly friendly to it, through the crises of the 50's,60's and 70's, Bermuda played a vital part in the importance of your bases.

Do you think that you could therefore at least give us the chance to explain exactly what role our tiny Island of Bermuda plays on the world stage...or do you plain and simply want the United States to have the only role?

Regretably it seems that with the very naming of this "project" you are bent on severely testing a friendship which must be one of the longest in the entire history of your country. I urge you to re-consider your stance, at least in respect of approaching this issue with open, honest, and fair, minds.
Thank you.
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BumbleBeeBoogie
 
  1  
Reply Wed 16 Apr, 2003 11:48 pm
Reply to Bermuda
Bermuda, apparently you are new to this forum - WELCOME!, we look forward to hearing more from you.

I suggest that you reread the first paragraph of the article I posted. I'm not the author of the article. I only posted it. I suggest you direct any questions about the Bermuda Project to those sponsors cited in the first paragraph of the article.

You certainly may make comments about the validity of the project's goals, but please don't assign responsibility for the project itself to an article's disinterested third-party poster.

BumbleBeeBoogie
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Bermuda
 
  1  
Reply Thu 17 Apr, 2003 05:43 am
posting error
My apologies BumbleBeeBoogie.
Yes I am new to this and did not mean to address your own posting, merely to add to the general postings. I'll read the instructions more clearly next time! Again my apologies.
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BumbleBeeBoogie
 
  1  
Reply Thu 17 Apr, 2003 09:13 am
Reply to Bermuda
Thanks, Bermuda, but no problem, its easy to get confused when joining a new forum.

I hope you will tell us more about your beautiful island.

BumbleBeeBoogie
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