Research

Make Corporations and Wealthy Pay Their Fair Share

Our public investment/growth and justice agenda requires tax revenues. Yet the corporations and the rich do not pay their fair share in taxes — even though they pocket the greatest benefits from public investments. Our tax code rigs the rules to favor the few. Multinationals pay lower tax rates than small domestic businesses.

Billionaire investors pay lower rates than their secretaries. Top income tax rates have been lowered even as working people face ever-higher sales taxes and fees. It is time for the rich and corporations to pay their fair share of taxes. It is time to shut down the tax havens and tax dodges that enable companies to avoid taxes altogether. We should lift the cap on Social Security taxes, so rich people pay the same percentage of their income as the rest of us. We should tax the income of investors at the same rates we tax income from work. We need clear, simple, progressive corporate and individual taxes, closing loopholes and exemptions. And a tax on financial transactions and can produce significant revenues. A fair tax system will allow us to invest in an economy that will work for all.

  • A decisive majority of Americans voters – 59% – support the Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’ proposal for a 70% marginal tax rate on the country’s top earners (The Hill-HarrisX, 2019)
  • “Half of the Republicans surveyed agree the US government should increase taxes on the richest 1%, along with 75% of Democrats.” (Oxfam, 2018)
  • “Just 24% say taxes on incomes over $250,000 should be reduced; 43% say they should be raised, while 29% favor keeping them the same as they are currently.” Also, majorities of Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents favor raising tax rates on both corporations (69%) and high incomes (57%), while Republicans are more divided.” (PEW, 2017)
  • “Slightly more than six in 10 Americans in recent years have consistently said that upper-income people pay too little in taxes…two-thirds of Americans today say corporations pay too little in taxes, with less than one in 10 saying corporations pay too much.” (Gallup, 2017)
  • 52% of Americans say taxes on corporations should be raised (PEW, 2017)
  • 73% of Americans believe the current US tax system favors the wealthy (ABC News/Washington Post Poll, Sept 2017)
  • In January, 55% of voters actively disapproved of Trump and the GOPs new tax plan (Gallup, Jan 2018)
  • Most Americans (62%-66%) said America’s wealthy will benefit disproportionately from the GOPs recent spending bill (Quinnipiac UniversityCNN, Jan 2018). Relatedly, 63% of Americans believed Donald Trump and his family will be better off due to the bill (and only 5% said worse off) (CNN, Jan 2018).