Inversion Perversion - a podcast by Laura Flanders

There’s US law and then there’s global trade law and if you ever felt inclined to believe that Congress rules the roost, just take a look at the Obama administration's evaporated pledge to take on corporate tax evaders.

Obama’s talked for years about shutting down tax havens that let companies re-register overseas in order to avoid paying US taxes. He signed laws and hired new officers. He’s also expressed support for the common-sense No Federal Contracts for Corporate Deserters Act (real name) which would bar companies that evade taxes from getting government contracts.

But when the talk hit the walk, the walk hit the skids. Or more precisely global trade rules.

According to Bloomberg News (www.accountingtoday.com/news/tax-prac…-75113-1.html), when one of the nation’s largest re-registered companies argued that barring contracts violated World Trade Organization non-discrimination law, the administration seems to have sided with the manufacturer.

In a move that goes by the confusing term "inversion," the company in question, Ingersoll Rand, switched its tax address from New Jersey to Bermuda in 2001 and to tax-friendly Ireland in 2009. And yet, in apparent violation of both Obama's rhetorical pledges and the Corporate Deserters Act, a Homeland Security lawyer cleared Ingersoll Rand for government work last year and the company won another federal contract this May to install energy-saving equipment on U.S. military bases.

According to Bloomberg, the White House has declined to comment. And that’s where things stand. Except, the exodus overseas continues. Burger King and the medical device-maker Medtronic Plc recently joined the flow of 50 US companies most of them in the past five years, taking off and taking almost $20 billion in lost tax revenues with them. Many more of these so-called "inversions" are in the works.

It’s the global corporations world. We just live in it. And in case you were wondering where, Ingersoll Rand lives. CEO Michael Lamach lives and works in Davidson, North Carolina, al administration office. His compensation jumped 30 percent, to $19.4 million last year on account of company profits surging. (www.bizjournals.com/charlotte/blog/…-good-year.html)


You can watch my interview with labor leader Larry Hanley of the International Transit Workers Union this week on The Laura Flanders Show on KCET/LINKtv and TeleSUR and find all my interviews and reports at  GRITtv.org.

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