The United States has the second highest corporate tax rate of the 30 members of The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD).
The U.S. rate is 39.25% compared to the OECD average of 26.6. Japan is first with a corporate tax rate of 39.54%.
When asked for his reaction to the findings, Senator Byron Dorgan, the co-commissioner of a recent GAO study that found that most U.S. corporations paid zero taxes, was heard to say, “oops!”
Predictably, Dorgan’s GAO study has been widely misinterpreted and exploited by anti-big business factions. See my recent blog post titled GAO Study on Corporate Taxes and the Scapegoating of Corporations for my take on the GAO study.
With a corporate tax rate that is 13 points higher than the worldwide average, it looks like U.S. corporations aren’t getting away with murder after all.
But dagnabbit it sure makes a great soundbite.
KUDOS:
Thanks to Paul Caron of TaxProf Blog for taking the lead on this issue in his post titled U.S. Corporate Tax 50% Higher than Worldwide Average.
And Joe Kirstan of Roth & Company’s TaxUpdates Blog blogged on the issue as well at But Who Would Be That Silly?
5 responses so far ↓
1 Ways & Means Chairman Charlie Rangel Wants to Reduce Corporate Tax Rate to 28% // Nov 17, 2008 at 1:16 am
[...] U.S. Corporate Tax Second Highest of 30 OECD Nations [...]
2 Repeal the Corporate Income Tax and Bring Those Jobs Back Home // Jan 18, 2009 at 9:56 pm
[...] into government work programs. The way to do this is to slash taxes. The U.S. corporate tax rate, currently the highest in the world, should be cut to 0% (corporate income would still be taxed, of course, when distributed to [...]
3 WSJ: Time to Repeal the Corporate Tax // May 6, 2010 at 10:39 pm
[...] U.S. Corporate Tax Second Highest of 30 OECD Nations [...]
4 Tax Lies: U.S. Corporations Pay Little or No Tax // May 14, 2010 at 12:09 am
[...] U.S. Corporate Tax Second Highest of 30 OECD Nations [...]
5 United States Business Tax Burden Increased in 2010 // May 17, 2010 at 8:09 am
[...] U.S. Corporate Tax Second Highest of 30 OECD Nations [...]
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