IRS may tax 100% of AIG bonus...
Mar. 17th, 2009 09:30 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
salinnOutraged Congress looking to recoup AIG bonuses through new taxes - Yahoo News
Love this. Full Link here - here are the highlights:
In the House, Reps. Steve Israel, D-N.Y., and Tim Ryan, D-Ohio, introduced a bill that would that would tax at 100 percent bonuses above $100,000 paid by companies that have received federal bailout money.
"It boggles my mind how these executives can be so unaware of what the American people are going through," said Ryan. He called his proposal "a wakeup call that the days of arrogance and greed on Wall Street are coming to an end. We will use any means necessary."
The Internal Revenue Service currently withholds 25 percent from bonuses less than $1 million and 35 percent for bonuses more than $1 million.
and
Sen. Charles Grassley suggested in an Iowa City radio interview on Monday that AIG executives should take a Japanese approach toward accepting responsibility by resigning or killing themselves.
Harsh much?
But seriously, my father and I were *just* talking about how the government could easily control this outrageous bonus/executive package by simply changing IRS code to reflect that any money earned by a top executive over $250k (or whatever limitation amount) ceases to be deductible by the business as an expense.
See how many businesses are willing to pay an executive 16 million when they can't deduct it from their own tax returns. But this works too...
Love this. Full Link here - here are the highlights:
In the House, Reps. Steve Israel, D-N.Y., and Tim Ryan, D-Ohio, introduced a bill that would that would tax at 100 percent bonuses above $100,000 paid by companies that have received federal bailout money.
"It boggles my mind how these executives can be so unaware of what the American people are going through," said Ryan. He called his proposal "a wakeup call that the days of arrogance and greed on Wall Street are coming to an end. We will use any means necessary."
The Internal Revenue Service currently withholds 25 percent from bonuses less than $1 million and 35 percent for bonuses more than $1 million.
and
Sen. Charles Grassley suggested in an Iowa City radio interview on Monday that AIG executives should take a Japanese approach toward accepting responsibility by resigning or killing themselves.
Harsh much?
But seriously, my father and I were *just* talking about how the government could easily control this outrageous bonus/executive package by simply changing IRS code to reflect that any money earned by a top executive over $250k (or whatever limitation amount) ceases to be deductible by the business as an expense.
See how many businesses are willing to pay an executive 16 million when they can't deduct it from their own tax returns. But this works too...
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Date: 2009-03-17 05:42 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-03-17 11:49 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-03-17 11:03 pm (UTC)I'm not sure what sorts of employees are getting all of these bonuses, but assuming it's a cross section of the company there are people at the bottom who likely could really use the extra money. Most of the remedies proposed in letters to the editor would hurt these people the most, so I hope that if any action is taken it focuses on the obscene bonuses not the fact that people are getting bonuses.
One possible solution off the top of my head is to cap the bonuses at $50k (or some other figure) per person. That would cut the overall cost of the bonuses by a fair bit, but still make sure that the people at the bottom get their full bonus.