The Republican tax cut is now six months old. And, more and more, it’s being recognized as the scam that it is. You may recall that shortly after its passage there we reports that workers were getting paid bonuses because their companies were profiting from the tax cuts. Trickle down economics were working, we were told.
Well, it turns out that only four-percent of workers got a bonus or pay increase due to the tax cut, according to an analysis of data by Americans for Tax Fairness.
At the same time that most of us weren’t getting a break from Donald Trump’s really big, really beautiful, tax cut America’s stock owners and senior corporate executive were reaping the benefits.
According to CNN Money S&P 500 companies poured $178 billion into Wall Street in the first three months after the tax break scam. That money was used not to create jobs but to buy back company shares.
“Total S&P 500 shareholder payouts -- buybacks plus dividends -- for the past 12 months could top $1 trillion for the first time ever,” CNN quoted Howard Silverblatt of S&P Dow Jones Indices as saying.
Although employment is up in the U.S. some of the companies that are benefiting from the Trump tax scam are laying off American workers and taking the formerly American jobs over seas. Take Harley Davidson, for example.
Trump met with Harley-Davidson workers and executives at the White House in February 2017. He promised them a rosy picture of more jobs and corporate expansion as a result of the tax cut that he was proposing.
Shortly after Trump’s proposal was passed by Congress and signed by Trump, Harley-Davidson announced that it was closing its Kansas City plant and laying off 800 workers. Some of those high paying union jobs would be shifted to non-union workers in Pennsylvania. Others would go to a new Harley-Davidson’s plant in Thailand.
After announcing the plant closure Harley-Davidson made a $700 million stock buy back.
“Harley-Davidson is one of a string of companies to announce major share buybacks since the tax bill was passed in December. Apple in early May said it would buy back $100 billion of its shares. The tech conglomerate Cisco in February said it would put an additional $25 billion toward a stock buyback. Troubled megabank Wells Fargo in January announced about $22 billion in buybacks. Pepsi announced a $15 billion buyback, Amgen and AbbVie $10 billion, and Google’s parent company Alphabet $8.6 billion,” Emily Stewart wrote in Vox (vox.com) on May 22nd.
“Harley-Davidson isn’t the only company to shutter a US plant since the tax cuts were passed in December. The same day Kansas City workers found out their plant was closing, about 900 workers at an Electrolux plant in St. Cloud, Minnesota, found out the facility they were working in would be shutting down too. The Swedish home appliance company will consolidate its freezer production in South Carolina, where Joe Baratta, a representative for International Association of Machinists (IAM) Local 623, told me starting wages are lower,” Stewart continued.
You can read Stewart’s excellent article here https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2018/5/22/17350180/harley-davidson-tax-buyback-kansas-city-factory
There is a movement afoot to repeal the Trump Tax Scam. It’s a long shot but we must think big. You can learn more about it, and sign a petition, by visiting Momsrising.org
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