During Thursday morning’s debate in Norwalk, Attorney General Richard Blumenthal mentioned that South Korea is using US technology to create a booming fuel-cell industry, while US companies need more-concerted support.
Linda McMahon:
“We clearly need to incentivize and I agree with that. Our business is here in our country. For South Korea to be using our technology, absolutely agree and that’s what I’m talking. We need to incentivize businesses here. We don’t need them to drive them offshore by having high tax rates. Let’s make R&D tax credits permanent here in our country. Let’s make sure that our corporate tax rates are competitive at least for around the world. Tax loopholes exist because companies who produce products outside the United States, or have offshore businesses, they pay the tax to that particular state and that is a credit against tax paid here. But the balance of that money gets taxed if you bring it back here to this country. Other countries don’t do that. If a company’s based here in the United States it’s a French company and they pay taxes here in the United States, they don’t pay it again in France. So what we’re doing is penalize companies. To now say that we’re going to close the tax loophole so that that company will have to pay the full tax on that dollar when it is earned outside of the United States? I can tell you what will happen. Companies won’t have a base here. They’ll go offshore completely. We won’t have any tax revenue and I think that’s backwards Mr. Blumenthal and it gets back to the fact you don’t understand business. It’s not your fault, you’ve been in government all your life.”
Blumenthal:
“The tax loopholes that encourage jobs to go overseas cost us more than $200 billion. We ought to close them. My opponent is siding with the special interest that would seek to retain them, just as she has sided with the energy interests in favor of the $40-billion in hidden subsidies and preferences that the energy interests receive and presumably also with the tax loopholes and subsidies that agri-business receives worth billions of dollars and the sweetheart deal that our pharmaceutical drug companies have received under the health care bill. That sweetheart deal costs us $200 billion. It prevents the federal government from negotiating Medicare drug prices that would save us that money and other measures that would cut waste and fraud in health care that’s absolutely necessary to make health care work. The present bill is simply a good step in the right direction but by no means the end of progress we need to make in our health care program. Standing up against special interests is in no way what my opponent wants to do. She has put profit ahead of people at every turn and that is the kind of United States senator she would be. I have fought for people and I would do so in Washington against those special interests, stand strong for the people of Connecticut.”