On Wednesday, Hillary Clinton will reportedly propose a new “exit tax” to target corporate inversions that help companies dodge taxes by moving overseas.
Current rules allow corporations to reincorporate abroad by merging with a foreign company and allocating more than 20% of shares to foreign shareholders, effectively lowering the U.S. company’s tax bill. Foreign earnings aren’t taxed until they’re brought into the U.S., so many companies tend to hold cash abroad and invest in a foreign country to avoid taxes. Experts estimate that corporations are holding over $2 trillion abroad.
Clinton’s exit tax would tax the company’s foreign earnings at the time of the inversion deal, the Associated Press reports, and she plans to use the revenue it would generate to create more manufacturing jobs in the U.S.
Clinton has been criticized throughout her campaign, particularly by rival candidate Bernie Sanders, for having close ties to Wall Street, which some believe will encourage her to be more lenient when it comes to financial regulation. She published a New York Times op-ed on Monday, entitled “How I’d Reign in Wall Street,” in which she pledged to be strict on the matter.
She writes that her plan proposes a risk fee on the largest banks, strengthened oversight, and harsher penalties for rule-breakers, both individuals and institutions.
Clinton addressed the issue of corporate inversions at a campaign event in Colorado last month, during which she said, “I want the Treasury Department to do everything it can to stop that kind of behavior and call it for what it is: gaming the tax system.”
