Quartz, February 1, 2017: This is the Republican plot to kill the US corporate income tax as we know it
“Economists consider this levy on corporate cash flow a consumption tax, because it falls on what consumers are ostensibly paying the company for—the value they add to their products, less the cost of the raw materials to purchase them. The Value-Added Tax, or VAT, is a popular example of this kind of consumption tax—effectively a national sales tax—enacted in many wealthy countries. Economists like to tax consumption because it’s not productive like savings or investment, and because there is so much of it. Indeed, VATs generate lots of revenue. Yet the VAT is also criticized because, as a sales tax, it is very regressive: It effects poor people more than the rich because the poor consume a greater share of their income.”