Real Reform No. 1: TAX REFORM
Don’t get your hopes up. Sweeping tax reform will probably get swept away by continued partisan brawling. But there is the federal corporate tax rate. This could be fixed by giving one love tap to the tax code. Consider the following... • The U.S. corporate tax rate is 35%. (The highest in the industrialized world.) • The worldwide average corporate tax rate is 22.96%. Europe’s average corporate tax rate is 18.35%. Ireland’s corporate tax rate is 12.5%. (Is the Irish economy’s amazing recovery from the Great Recession a mere coincidence?) China’s corporate tax rate is 25%. (But can be discounted to as little as 15% for “government encouraged” industries. Can you spell D-U-M-P-I-N-G?) Is the U.S. corporate tax rate of 35% competitive? Were the Detroit Tigers competitive in Major League Baseball post-season play? Real Reform No. 2: TORT REFORM Four possible quick fixes that would help us say goodbye to “Litigation Nation:” Institute a “Loser Pays” tort system. The loser of a lawsuit pays the legal fees of the winner, plus all court costs. This should make people think twice before they sue Dairy Queen for the pain and emotional distress of getting “brain freeze” due to DQ’s ice cream being too cold.
100 | October 2017
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