The audacity of stupidity and being too young to remember the Carter Administration.
May 1 (Bloomberg) — Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama‘s proposal for a windfall profits tax on oil companies could cost $15 billion a year at last year’s profit levels, a campaign adviser said.
The plan would target profit from the biggest oil companies by taxing each barrel of oil costing more than $80, according to a fact sheet on the proposal
Corporations, even the dreaded evil oil companies, do not pay taxes. Corporations can only do one of two things with expenses One, they pass them on to their shareholders in form of lower dividends. Two,, they can pass them on to the consumer in the form of higher prices. There is no other option,a and neither lower the cost of gasoline as much one red cent.
So if the American consumer is the loser under BO’s plan, just who is the winner, Wall Street Journal.
You may also be wondering how a higher tax on energy will lower gas prices. Normally, when you tax something, you get less of it, but Mr. Obama seems to think he can repeal the laws of economics. We tried this windfall profits scheme in 1980. It backfired. The Congressional Research Service found in a 1990 analysis that the tax reduced domestic oil production by 3% to 6% and increased oil imports from OPEC by 8% to 16%. Mr. Obama nonetheless pledges to lessen our dependence on foreign oil, which he says “costs America $800 million a day.” Someone should tell him that oil imports would soar if his tax plan becomes law. The biggest beneficiaries would be OPEC oil ministers.
You lose. OPEC wins.
Tags: America, Barack, Bloomberg, BO, Carter, Energy, gas, gasoline, Mr. Obama, oil, OPEC, profit, tax, Wall Street
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