Romney's association with corporate tax shelter phantom loss generating schemes #p2 #tcot @gop

"Bloomberg's Jesse Drucker has been doing some research into presidential candidate Mitt Romney and come up with some interesting information--at least for those of us who find corporate involvement in aggressive tax shelter phantom loss generating schemes a worrisome problem.  See Drucker, Romney as Audit Chair Saw Marriott Son of Boss Shelter Defy IRS, Bloomberg.com (Feb. 22, 2012).

Mitt Romney has been on the board of Marriott INternational Inc. on and off since 1993, and has served as chair of the audit committee for 6 years.  During that period, the company has used aggressive tax avoidance deals, including (i) the "Son of BOSS" tax shelter structure for generating artificial losses that could be used to offset gains from other sources, thus reducing taxable income and tax liabilities and (ii)  shifting profits to a Luxembourg shell company.  Marriott's effective tax rate has been as low as 6.8%, even though the federal statutory rate for corporations is 35%.

These factoids demonstrate two things.

First, as the Bloomberg.com article points out, Romney claims that his business experience is the primary reason that Americans should want to see him in the White House.  Contrary to his claim, it seems to me that the more we hear about his business experience the less I think he is suited to the White House. "

rest at http://ataxingmatter.blogs.com/tax/2012/02/romneys-association-with-corporate-tax-shelter-schemes.html