Tax Lawyer's Blog

Does anyone else find this ironic?

Charlie Rangel, no stranger to being hit over the head with his own tax bloopers, has questioned the proposed use of tax legislation to recoup any bonuses paid to executives of the AIG Financial Derivatives division.

So have others.

Listen to what Time Magazine’s Jay Newton-Small says:

In any event, any tax-the-bonuses bill is likely to meet powerful opposition.

House Ways & Means Chairman Charlie Rangel, the Congress’ top tax writer, told reporters that taxing the bonuses “is a venting type of thing. I would hope and assume we have alternatives to the tax codes… When you get angry you don’t think as clearly as when you calm down.” He added: “It is tough to me to think of the tax code as a political weapon.”

Rangel would be a huge obstacle to any such bill, no matter who originates it.

Others say that type of legislation would raise the ugly face of nationalization and the specter of politicians micro-managing the financial system because the government “owns” it.

Rep. Elijah Cummings, a senior member of the House Oversight Committee who has been active looking into AIG for months, also said he doesn’t believe it’s lawful to tax the bonuses just to get them back. “We’re going to have to recoup it from the company and there’s going to have to be some type of investigation,” he told TIME.

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