August Recess &Tax Reform Goals

AUGUST RECESS &TAX REFORM GOALS

August recess is a great opportunity to interact with members of Congress and pressure them on tax reform. Their town halls present a special chance to ask direct questions about their support for corporate tax reform.

Find a Town Hall Near You

Some resources for learning about Congressional town halls happening in your state include:

• Member of Congress’s website, Facebook, and/or Twitter
• Senate websites:
• House websites:
• Senate social media links:
• House social media links:
• Accountable Congress:

Sample Questions to Ask

• Corporations need to pay their fair share of taxes. A lot of them pay nothing now. Do you want big corporations to may more in taxes, as I believe they should? Or do you want to close tax loopholes but give the savings back to corporations in the form of lower tax rates? If you give the money back to them we won’t have the new revenuesneededto pay for services and investments that benefit families and communities.
• We need to close the loopholes that encourage corporations to shift jobs and profits offshore. Offshore profits should not be taxed at a lower rate than domestic profits. This creates an incentive for companies to move production offshore and disguise domestic profits as offshore profits. Will you close the corporate offshore loopholes?Or do you want to lower the tax rate on offshore profits, which will give corporations even more incentives to offshore jobs and profits?
• U.S. corporations have $2.1 trillion in profits offshore that have not been taxed here at home. A giant loophole lets companies defer paying taxes on these profits until they are brought home. That’s crazy. Now some in Congress want to fund highway construction by letting companies pay less than a 14% tax rate on these offshore profits. That’s far below the 35% corporate tax rate. Do you support this plan to give out huge breaks to tax dodgers?
• I oppose tax-extender legislation, which gives away tens of billions in tax breaks to corporations every year. But if you are going to pass such legislation again this year I want you to provide a similar amount of tax breaks to working families through the Earned Income Tax Credit and the Child Tax Credit. These provide huge incentives for people to work at low-wage jobs. Will you support making permanent the 2009 improvements to EITC and CTC and expanding EITC for workers not raising children?

Take Advantage of Twitter

Can’t make it to a town hall or didn’t get a chance to ask your question? You can ask questions of members of Congress on Twitter too. Below are some sample tweets (don’t forget to include the period before the member of Congress’s Twitter handle):

• .@TwitterHandle We need corp tax reform. How will you close loopholes that encourage corps to shift jobs & profits offshore?
• .@TwitterHandle The @robportman @SenSchumer intl tax reform framework falls short of real reform. Will you oppose it?
• .@TwitterHandle Will you support making #EITC and CTC perm & expanding EITC to workers not raising children?

Let Us Know How it Went

You can report that you asked a question and any response you received via our online Activity Report Form: