Center for Freedom and Prosperity
For Immediate Release
Wednesday, September 26, 2012
202-285-0244
www.freedomandprosperity.org
CF&P Documents Radical Statist Agenda of Tax Competition Foes
(Washington, D.C., Wednesday, September 26, 2012) The Center for Freedom and Prosperity released today a Strategic Memorandum warning about the radical agenda pursued by opponents of tax competition. The Memorandum documents how opponents of low-tax jurisdictions and good fiscal policy are highly organized, politically emboldened and aggressively pursuing an otherwise unpopular and radical agenda.
Link to the memorandum: http://freedomandprosperity.org/2012/publications/the-radical-agenda-of-anti-tax-competition-forces/
Citing the words and actions of tax competition foes, the memorandum documents a concerted effort to expand national governments, empower international bureaucrats, and erode both individual financial privacy rights and national fiscal sovereignty.
Troubling items on the opposition agenda, as shown in the memorandum, include: 1) Misuse of the idea of “fairness” to massively expand government, 2) A belief that private dollars are not being “put to use” until they are confiscated by government, and 3) that today’s bloated governments are actually “starved” of revenue.
CF&P President Andrew Quinlan commented, “Our fight to protect tax competition has never been more challenging. If the statists succeed in crippling fiscal sovereignty and financial privacy, it will mean expanded governments, reduced private investment, and less global prosperity.”
Dan Mitchell of the Cato Institute warned that “the welfare state may have reached an unsustainable tipping point, but the fiscal crisis in Europe has motivated governments to increase their attack on low-tax jurisdictions in order to give them the power to impose even more destructive tax policies.”
Anti-tax competition groups listed in the memorandum include the Tax Justice Network, Citizens for Tax Justice, FACT Coalition, New Rules for Global Finance, Business for Shared Prosperity, Wealth for the Common Good, American Sustainable Business Council, The Main Street Alliance, and Business and Investors Against Tax Haven Abuse. The groups are relentlessly pursuing more class-warfare tax policy to fund everything from global redistribution in the name of climate change to a wish list of programs from the international far left to promote “social justice.”
Brian Garst, CF&P’s Director of Government Affairs, observed, “The fight over tax competition is really a proxy fight between statism and individual liberty. Tax competition is a target for statist groups because it provides a check on the excessive growth of government and works as a means to defend individual liberties.”
CF&P’s mission is to educate the public and members of Congress on the benefits of tax competition, financial privacy and fiscal sovereignty.
For additional comments:
Andrew Quinlan can be reached at 202-285-0244, andy@freedomandprosperity.org
Dan Mitchell can be reached at 202-218-4615, dmitchell@cato.org
Brian Garst can be reached at bgarst@freedomandprosperity.org
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