The Pork Barrel Runneth Over in New Tax Proposal

[goobergunch]

By EDMUND L. ANDREWS

Published: October 30, 2003

ASHINGTON, Oct. 29 — It has been promoted as a bill to create jobs, to enhance American competitiveness and to level the playing field for companies overseas.

But as House lawmakers pushed ahead this week with the biggest overhaul of corporate taxes in two decades, they found themselves briefly fixated on bows and arrows.

"U.S. manufacturers of bows and arrows are fleeing in droves for Korea and China," said Representative Paul D. Ryan, Republican of Wisconsin. The problem, he told members of the House Ways and Means Committee, is that American arrows are hit with a 12.4 percent excise tax, but imported arrows are not.

So it was that members of the tax-writing committee agreed to drop the excise tax on arrows, along with excise taxes for fishing tackle boxes and fish-finding devices that use sonar. Liquor and wine distributors were given a four-year tax break worth $234 million and movie studios received a break on foreign royalties worth $600 million over 10 years.

These and other special-interest nuggets were little more than pocket change in a bill that would offer corporations $128 billion in new tax relief over the next decade.

more...http://www.nytimes.com/2003/10/30/business/30TAX.html?hp

:puke: :puke: :puke:

[bigwavebobby]

1. I never have to edit my posts

They are perfect......always.

[Brucey]

2. Pigs love pork.

Wyh eidt? I ma prefect two.