Elizabeth Warren: “our Tax Code is tilted toward the rich and the powerful. Huge corporations hire armies of lobbyists and lawyers to…”

“our Tax Code is tilted toward the rich and the powerful. Huge corporations hire armies of lobbyists and lawyers to create, expand, and protect every last corporate loophole. That is how we end up with a tax code that makes small businesses and restaurants and construction companies pay, that makes teachers and truckdrivers and nurses pay, but that allows huge American corporations to make billions of dollars in profits and not pay a single dime in taxes. The Tax Code is rigged. Apparently, even this rigged game does not go far enough for some corporations. Those companies are taking advantage of a new move--a loophole that allows them to maintain all their operations in America but claim foreign citizenship so they can cut their U.S. taxes even further. Here is how the loophole works. An American company merges with a much smaller company located in a foreign country, usually a tax haven such as Ireland or Bermuda. As long as the shareholders of the foreign company own 20 percent of the newly merged company, our tax laws allow that new company to claim foreign citizenship. That means American companies can hire a bunch of Wall Street bankers and a bunch of lawyers, fill out some paperwork, keep everything the same in their operations, and dodge their U.S. taxes. Tax lawyers call this process a corporate inversion, but do not let that bland name fool you.…”