With job outsourcing a hot political topic right now, there is support from some members of both parties to give businesses incentives and tax breaks for bringing jobs home instead of sending them overseas. But Wisconsin’s U.S. Senators are on opposite sides of the debate over legislation aimed at accomplishing that.
Democratic Senator Tammy Baldwin is hoping the Bring Jobs Home Act can get enough support to remove the tax code that rewards businesses for exporting jobs. “This measure repeals that perverse tax incentive, and in its place says let’s actually send the right message. Let’s say if you bring jobs back that there’s a tax credit,” said Baldwin.
Wisconsin Republican Senator Ron Johnson was one of seven Senators who recently voted against bringing the bill to the floor for a vote, arguing it’s the wrong approach. “It would actually make America a less attractive place (for business),” Johnson said. “The reason people are doing these corporate inversions is that we have the highest business tax rate in the developed world.”
Baldwin said over the last decade, 2.4 million jobs were shipped overseas because of a loophole that allows businesses to deduct the cost of moving personnel and components to other countries when filing taxes. “This is in something that has been sort of out of whack in our tax code for many years, it’s high time we fix it.”
“There are no special loopholes for corporations that move from location to location,” said Johnson, who has argued that the tax code is in need of drastic revision. “What we should do is scrap the current tax code, and then write something that is pretty simple, that raises the revenue we need, and does no economic harm,” Johnson said.
WSAU contributed to this report