To: The United States House of Representatives and The United States Senate
Taxpayers shouldn't subsidize big bank fraud
Corporations should not be able to deduct giant CEO pay packages from their taxes. Congress must pass the Stop Subsidizing Multimillion Dollar Corporate Bonuses Act.
Why is this important?
Every year, taxpayers are subsidizing giant bonuses to CEOs. That’s because corporations can deduct unlimited amounts of executive compensation from their taxable income — as long as the pay is “performance-based.”
Under the leadership of CEO John Stumpf, Wells Fargo created 2 million accounts that customers never asked for. But in the years while this was happening, taxpayers were effectively subsidizing the fraud, as Wells Fargo cashed in on $54 million in tax subsidies for Stumpf’s “performance-based” compensation!
This egregious loophole costs taxpayers more than $5 billion dollars a year. Thankfully, there is already a bill in the Senate to close it, S. 1127, introduced by Senators Jack Reed (D-RI) and Richard Blumenthal (D-CT). But we need as many Senators as possible to co-sponsor this bill, so that companies like Wells Fargo no longer get to turn big CEO bonuses into big tax breaks.
Learn more:
The Institute for Policy Studies, Executive Excess 2016: The Wall Street CEO Bonus Loophole, ips-dc.org/executive-excess-2016-wall-street-ceo-bonus-loophole-2/
Senator Reed Urges Congress to Responsibly Offset Tax Cuts by Closing Tax Loopholes, reed.senate.gov/news/releases/reed-urges-congress-to-responsibly-offset-tax-cuts-by-closing-tax-loopholes/
Under the leadership of CEO John Stumpf, Wells Fargo created 2 million accounts that customers never asked for. But in the years while this was happening, taxpayers were effectively subsidizing the fraud, as Wells Fargo cashed in on $54 million in tax subsidies for Stumpf’s “performance-based” compensation!
This egregious loophole costs taxpayers more than $5 billion dollars a year. Thankfully, there is already a bill in the Senate to close it, S. 1127, introduced by Senators Jack Reed (D-RI) and Richard Blumenthal (D-CT). But we need as many Senators as possible to co-sponsor this bill, so that companies like Wells Fargo no longer get to turn big CEO bonuses into big tax breaks.
Learn more:
The Institute for Policy Studies, Executive Excess 2016: The Wall Street CEO Bonus Loophole, ips-dc.org/executive-excess-2016-wall-street-ceo-bonus-loophole-2/
Senator Reed Urges Congress to Responsibly Offset Tax Cuts by Closing Tax Loopholes, reed.senate.gov/news/releases/reed-urges-congress-to-responsibly-offset-tax-cuts-by-closing-tax-loopholes/