While the Koch Brothers are obviously supportive of plans that reduce corporate taxes, a proposal being considered by Republicans goes too far even for them.
Republicans are considering a massive shift in the tax code that would eliminate corporate income taxes and eliminate taxes on exports, but slap a tax on imports and domestic sales.
This, according to the infamous brothers, could be "devastating."
In a statement, Koch objected to the plan’s proposal to replace the current corporate income tax with a 20 percent levy on U.S. companies’ domestic sales and on their imports of foreign goods and materials. Exports under the plan would be tax-free.
The proposal, which is generally known by the term “border adjustments,” would “adversely impact American consumers by forcing them to pay higher prices on products produced in and goods imported to the U.S. that they use every single day,” the company said in the statement.
They aren't wrong and you certainly don't need to take their word for it. You need only look around you to see that virtually everything in your home was imported. The clothes you're wearing right now and even the food we're accustomed to eating all year long depends on imports. Fresh produce sold in the winter obviously didn't come from local farms.
It's no mystery that these increased costs of doing business would be passed down to consumers at no benefit to them because it's not as if whole industries will suddenly uproot and build a manufacturing base in America. Even if they did, the overwhelming majority of the manufacturing would be automated.
It makes me just as uncomfortable as anyone, but we'll soon find ourselves in a position where the best hope for saving the American economy may be the likes of Wal-Mart and the Koch Brothers who are both lobbying against these proposed changes.
As it turns out, there is a line between their desire to pay less taxes and ideological proposals that could devastate their entire business model and possibly cause a recession.
The U.S. Chamber of Commerce threw in with Trump and GOP candidates this election cycle, but I'm not as convinced as they seem to be that they can effectively control the Trump regime.