Eliminating corporate income taxes will make billionaires richer, hurt NC

By
December 8, 2021
In Commentary, NC Budget and Tax Center

When North Carolina legislators had a chance to address the rapidly increasing economic inequality of the past 30 years, they ignored the needs of workers and the state and instead passed harmful tax cuts. Instead of supporting low-income households or making sure large corporations pay what they owe, the 2021-2023 budget slashes the corporate income tax (CIT), a move that disproportionately benefits wealthy, out-of-state executives and shareholders.

When a company gets a tax break and so turns a larger profit, the primary result is a higher stock value – not more jobs or higher wages for average people. This money goes straight into the pockets of already-ultra-wealthy executives, who own stock in overwhelmingly disproportionate amounts compared to the average American.

The myth that shareholders then pass these gains on to their workers has been touted since the 1980s, but the promised benefit for average workers has never materialized. When North Carolina passed tax cuts in 2013, the state’s personal income growth rate dropped in comparison to neighboring states. In 2017, when the federal government passed another round of tax cuts, fewer than 5% of workers saw bonuses or raises tied to the change.

Not only will eliminating the CIT in the state budget fail to boost workers’ incomes, but much of the corporate savings from the tax break will vanish from the local economy altogether. Estimates show that over 80% of this break will go to out-of-state shareholders. Of the small number of beneficiaries in North Carolina, almost 70 percent of the tax cut will go to the richest 20% of taxpayers. The bottom 20% of North Carolinians will see only 2% of these tax changes.

These cuts will cost the state nearly $1 billion, money that could ensure equality-boosting programs like child care, a sound education for every child, and other health and income supports that make sure families are safe, secure and well.

Additionally, this policy choice directly fuels a dangerous trend that has exploded in the past 30 years: the growth of the billionaire class. In 1990, there were only 66 billionaires in the country, and the wealthiest among them was only worth $5.6 billion. Today, there are more than 600. Elon Musk, the richest man in the world, crossed the $300 billion net worth threshold in early November.

The most dramatic change, however, has been in the past year. Since the start of the pandemic, when over 20 million jobs were lost in a few short months, massive stock market gains have resulted in billionaires adding over a trillion dollars to their collective net worth. Eliminating the corporate income tax boosts this disparity.

By buying into the fable of tax cuts, legislators are costing the state crucial funds and hurting the average North Carolinian.

 Emma Cohn is an intern with the N.C. Budget & Tax Center. 

Richest North Carolinians already pay so little in taxes; Senate budget would make it even worse

By
June 25, 2021
In Commentary, NC Budget and Tax Center

ProPublica’s analysis of recently-revealed tax documents from the ultra-rich reveals that they pay almost nothing in taxes – completely legally – because the U.S. tax code primarily targets reported income rather than total wealth. Because the vast majority of the top earners’ fortunes are stored in stocks and other assets, their income tax ends up being tiny fraction of what they’re worth.  

The average worker does not have this luxury.  

Unfortunately, rather than rebalance the tax system in the average citizen’s favor, the North Carolina Senate’s proposed budget would make inequality worse. Senate Bill 105 would eliminate the corporate income tax (CIT) and lower the already flattened personal income tax (PIT), which is exactly the opposite of what needs to be done.  

This inequality is not the result of an oft-exploited loophole – it is built directly into the tax code. From the beginning, rich interests lobbied hard to keep their wealth from being taxed in the same way as earned income, allowing them to shift much of the tax burden onto everyday workers. 

Today, the U.S.’s definition of earned income only includes the value of stocks, property, and other assets if the owner decides to sell and collect a paycheck for them. If not, those assets are ignored. In the United States, the vast majority of wealth owned by the top 1 percent is in the form of these so-called unrealized gains, with only a small percentage of their net worth in the form of a reportable income. CEOs like Jeff Bezos, for example, have yearly wages set as low as $80,000, yet are worth billions of dollars.  

The majority of Americans, however, do not hold treasure troves of untaxed wealth in the same way. Many people live paycheck to paycheck, their wages going straight to paying for necessities, not to buying up real estate. Additionally, most Americans do not own extensive stock portfolios that exist to buoy their personal wealth while shrinking their tax burden. In fact, the bottom 50 percent of the wealth index own less than 1 percent of all corporate equity and mutual fund shares in the United States. 

Now some leaders in the General Assembly want to let billionaires amass even more wealth.   Read more

Stock wealth boomed during pandemic for wealthiest 1%

By
June 7, 2021
In Commentary, COVID-19, NC Budget and Tax Center

For people who derive most of their wealth from stock equity, it has been a very good financial year. In turn, massive stock market gains in the middle of a global pandemic have widened inequality along both wealth and racial lines.

Although the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on job loss and wage fluctuation have been felt personally by many North Carolinians, the pandemic’s effect on company stock ownership may be less obvious to the average resident. This is largely because those in the top 1 percent of the wealth index own more than half of all corporate equity and mutual fund shares in the United States, whereas the bottom 50 percent own less than 1 percent. Despite this, changes in share value during 2020 have had a significant impact on economic inequality.

Stock and mutual fund wealth fell off by roughly 23 percent during the first quarter of 2020 when the stock market was first feeling the effects of COVID-19. However, by the end of 2020, equity ownership had not only returned to pre-pandemic levels, it had also surpassed them by over 17 percent. In the last fiscal quarter before the pandemic (Q4:2019), the top 1 percent held $15.10 trillion in stock and mutual funds, which had ballooned to nearly $17.8 trillion by the end of 2020. Last year, the richest 1 percent in the U.S. acquired $2.7 trillion in stock and mutual fund wealth while the poorest half of Americans saw less than $0.03 trillion in this kind of equity wealth growth. A typical household in the top 1 percent amassed around 4,500 times more new wealth in stock and mutual fund growth during 2020 than the average household in the bottom 50 percent.

Barriers to access to stock ownership mean COVID-19 also widened the racial disparity in equity wealth. Black people own only 1 percent of corporate equity and mutual fund shares, while an overwhelming 89 percent of shares are owned by white people. As a result, the growth of the stock market over the last year has exacerbated the pre-existing economic inequality between Black and white workers, further concentrating wealth in a small number of rich bank accounts.

Emma Cohn is an intern at the N.C. Budget & Tax Center.