business taxes

He doesn't quit thinking about ways to grow "brick and morter" jobs according to this report in the Herald business section.  The Retailers are doing a good job branding this as Main St Fairness.

House Speaker Robert DeLeo was sympathetic to a room full of Bay State retailers yesterday, but the Winthrop Democrat stopped short of endorsing a proposal to tax their competition: online retailers.

“I want to let you folks know that I heard you loudly,” DeLeo told members of the Retailers Association of Massachusetts at a luncheon at Bentley University. “It’s something I’m going to analyze very carefully.”

The retail trade group supports legislation to require out-of-state online retailers such as Amazon to collect sales taxes on Bay State purchases. But DeLeo, who said he never buys online, isn’t so sure he’s ready to adopt the tax.

“I’m not a new tax guy,” DeLeo told the Herald. “But I’m hearing from lots of retailers who feel they’re at a disadvantage. I want to see local businesses thrive and not get eaten up by an unfair playing field. But right now I am in no way endorsing this measure.”

Jon Hurst, president of the Retailers Association of Massachusetts, said support for the so-called Main Street Fairness law is essential to level the playing field.

“We either have to apply the law for online sales or remove it from brick-and-mortar retailers,” Hurst said.

I had a hunch about how the two "mini-movements" differed but Kate Zernike in the New York Times did a great job of documenting my simple observations. (Always a good idea.)

She said it is more that a culture war, "young versus old, left versus right, communal food tables versus “Don’t Tread on Me” flags." Here are a couple of paragraphs, but you really should read the whole thing. 

In fact, the two movements do share key traits. They emerged out of nowhere but quickly became potent political forces, driven by anxiety about the economy, a belief that big institutions favor the reckless over the hard-working, grievances that are inchoate and even contradictory, and an insistence that they are “leaderless.” “End the Fed” signs — and even some of those yellow Gadsden flags — have found a place at Tea Party and Occupy Wall Street protests alike.

Where they differ is in where they place the blame. While Occupy forces find fault in the banks and super-rich, the Tea Party movement blames the government for the economic calamity brought on by the mortgage crisis, and sees the wealthy as job creators who will lift the country out of its economic malaise. To them, the solution is less regulation of banks, not more.

Gov. Chris Christie of New Jersey declared Monday, “If you told the Occupy Wall Street people and the Tea Party people that they are the same, they would hit you.”

Thank you Governor, wouldn't want to get hit by either one of those groups.

We thought the Repbulicans especially did not approve of dany new taxes, and now they want to count casino revenues as taxes?  What next? Fishing fees?

As reported by by Channel 22 in Springfield.

I was really surprised to see the Leadership in the Senate try to define casino revenues as taxes. Good grief, what is the world coming to?

As Channel 22 in Springfield reported

Sen. Knapik of Westfield also tried to convince lawmakers to adopt his amendment that would direct taxable gaming revenues to relieve taxpayers.
“You know we’re going to create a long term, sustained, brand new revenue stream for the citizens of Massachusetts, we ought not be spending all of it,” said Knapik. “Some of it certainly is going into the rainy day fund, but maybe we can lower the income tax.”

Knapik’s amendment was eventually rejected.

Here's a twist on the tax discussion...raise the taxes on those least able to pay (more) and who are currently paying the highest percentage of income in taxes.  This political platform may get a candidate more corporate contributions, but as we know, corporations aren't people and they don't vote.  Think about it...who earns the money that's not being contributed/taxed at the similar percentage of income basis to pay for the programs and services that we all depend and rely upon on a daily basis?

The moral argument would have been obvious before this polarized year. Nearly 90 percent of the families that paid no income tax make less than $40,000, most much less...At a time when high-income households are paying their lowest share of federal taxes in decades, when corporations frequently avoid paying any tax, it is clear who should bear a larger burden and who should not . [Full Editorial: The New York Times]

$44 million in tax breaks to businesses...included in this is ~$317 thousand to Bank of New York Mellon Corp, the organization that Treasurer Steve Grossman says overcharged the MA state pension funds $30.5 million since 2000.  Are the different departments communicating within the Administration?

A state economic development board today approved state and local tax breaks for 16 firms that promised to add or retain jobs in Massachusetts. [Full Article: Boston Globe]

Legislation garnering praise for its potential for stimulating economic growth...

...Governor Deval Patrick on Wednesday signed legislation that advances the redevelopment of Quincy Center and could provide a model for other communities...the Legislation lays out the specifics in terms of how labor rules will work for the project, how a parking plan between Street-Works and the City will be managed, and specifies flexibility in the financing outlined in the master agreement.  The petition allows Quincy to bend the tax rules to help fund the project. [Full Article: Boston Globe]

Imagine if corporations invested in our communities, via taxes without legislative loopholes, how much more financially sound this country would be. Noble goal, indeed.

They are high-tech companies, financial players, and manufacturers. What they all have in common: They paid no federal income taxes last year, despite making millions of dollars in profits… They are beneficiaries of longtime tax breaks for corporations, tax specialists say, coupled in some cases with shorter-term tax benefits that lawmakers introduced in the past three years to help companies during the recession. Indeed, more than one-quarter of 112 profitable, publicly traded companies in the Commonwealth did not write checks to Uncle Sam for the 2010 tax year, according to a Globe review of tax data filed with regulators and compiled by Standard & Poor’s Capital IQ. [Full Article: Boston Globe]

When will additional revenues for the Commonwealth enter into the Administration's conversation?

State finances are tight now, but when the economy improves, a tax break to help encourage the video game industry should be considered to help bring more jobs to Massachusetts, Lt. Gov. Tim Murray said Thursday… With the state struggling with a tight budget, it would be "premature" to talk about reducing revenues through tax breaks now, he said, but in the future the administration and Legislature sould consider extending a movie-making tax credit to video games companies… Any future tax credit for the industry would have be linked to job creation with a strong "clawback" provision to reimburse the state if the jobs do not materialize, he said. [Full Article: Sun Chronicle]