Special interest lobbying firms have played such a major role in where the US unfortunately is today:
…..9.2% Unemployment Rate
…..16% Combined Unemployment/Underemployment Rate
…..$14.4 trillion National Debt
…..Sky high Energy Costs
…..Sky high Health Care Costs
…..Tepid GDP growth
…..High percentage of Homes Under Water
I think a wise initiative would be for the US Government to now institute an annual gross receipts tax on the lobbying revenue of firms engaged in lobbying.
I would make this annual gross receipts tax on firms engaged in lobbying highly progressive. To be fair, I think a certain amount of gross receipts from lobbying should be tax free. But above this exempt amount, there should be a gross receipts tax starting at say 10%, which progressively keeps increasing so that the largest amount of gross receipts from lobbying would get taxed at say 70%. Thus, the more special interest lobbying you do, the higher gross receipts tax rate you pay.
Clearly, the lobbying sections of the large law firms should be assessed this gross receipts tax on their gross receipts from lobbying. But also, I think non-profit organizations involved heavily in lobbying for industry special interests should also be subject to this gross receipts tax.
When you think about it, there are a handful of large non-profit organizations that have severely damaged the US economy in the 2000s Lost Decade, and continue to do so.
All Big US Multinational Corp non-profit organizations like the Business Roundtable, the Chamber of Commerce, numerous special industry organizations, as well as many other organizations, have successfully lobbied for the offshoring of US jobs, despite the massively detrimental effect to the country and to its citizens, and thus, in all fairness, should be assessed an annual gross receipts tax.
Big Oil lobbying organizations like the American Petroleum Institute have also severely damaged the US economy by playing a key role in the placing of excessive energy cost burdens on US citizens and US businesses, and thus should clearly be assessed an annual gross receipts tax.
Also, three very influential non-profit health care organizations played instrumental roles in creating the 2000s Lost Decade, where health care costs went through the roof to US individuals, to US businesses, and to the US and State Governments.
More than any other organization, I think the American Hospital Association has been a major cause of these massively higher health care costs.
Also, through their effective efforts, the America’s Health Insurance Plans and the America Pharmaceutical Association both added much to the country’s health care costs.
And the efforts of all three of these health care lobbying organizations caused the Affordable Health Care legislation to be hundreds of billions of dollars higher than it should have been. Thus, all three of these health care non-profit organizations, should be assessed a gross receipts tax.
People a lot smarter than me can determine specifically which other non-profit organizations performing lobbying should, in all fairness, be assessed an annual gross receipts tax.
All of the tax proceeds from this Gross Receipts Tax should be used to reduce the US Deficit.
And there is a second major benefit. Due to this high Gross Receipts Tax on excessive lobbying, perhaps this could also reduce somewhat the extent of special interest lobbying, which has placed such financial strains on the US economy, and on US job creation.
