The big news on all the networks this weekend is that Trump may have paid no taxes for several years. It seems that for tax year 1995, Trump's business lost almost one billion dollars. Because business losses can be carried forward into future years, that gave Trump a sizable deduction to use as a credit later on.
This is not only basic accounting, but legal under the tax code. The New York Times is making a big deal out of this, with the implication that Trump is doing something improper. Way down in the article the NYT even admits that this is legal. They are arguing, in essence that one should pay more taxes than the law requires if you were a good person. Personally, I think there are better ways to give away money than giving it to the government. The IRS will accept donations, but they won't accept bad accounting on your tax return.
The Sunday morning talk shows were all over this. Chuck Todd on Meet the Press called this a "loophole", and the Clinton campaign is all over the story. I would venture to say that none of these people have done their own taxes in a really long time, or else they would be more familiar with the tax code and GAAP (generally accepted accounting practices) which regulates how one reports income.
Of course, both the New York Times and the Clintons took advantage of this "loophole"
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