Soak the Rich, Week 8

Senator Sherrod Brown thinks cutting federal spending is wrong, and insists we can balance the budget by raising taxes on America's largest employers. For two months now we've been calculating the results of applying Sherrod's Sure-Fire Budget Oil to evil corporations and their fat-cat CEOs. It's an uphill climb, considering the U.S. government's 2011 budget deficit of $1.62 trillion.

Starting with the ten largest corporations in the S&P 500 index, we’ve soaked 16 of the planet's most successful businesses. This is what Senator Brown and President Obama want, right? Everything they do suggests federal spending is an objective good... as long as it's not military spending. Though Brown and Obama aren’t specific about their assuredly non-socialist methodology, we’ve taken a leap to doubled corporate income taxes and fully “reclaimed” CEO pay.

If these extreme measures (view Excel summary) won’t work, there’s a tiny chance Sherrod Brown is either ignorant or dishonest to claim the budget could be balanced by making The Rich pay their fair share!

By dramatically increasing taxes on sixteen of America’s largest companies, we could reduce the 2011 U.S. budget deficit from $1,620,000,000,000 to $1,533,427,121,060. That’s a 5.344% slice of a single year’s deficit pie. Even if soaking a few hundred more employers could cover the remaining 94.656% of the 2011 deficit, would it be worth it?

Of course it would! As any Progressive will tell you, raising taxes on The Rich has no negative effects. Among the things that won’t happen if Sherrod Brown taxes his way to the chart above:

• None of the corporations’ 4,677,960 employees will lose their jobs.
• None of the products or services – gasoline, air travel, fast food, construction equipment, business & consumer lending, the thousands of items available at Wal-Mart, prescription drugs, medical devices, computer software, cell phone service, broadband access, Band-Aids, baby soap, iPods, laptops, servers, networking equipment, toothpaste, diapers, detergent, etc. – sold by these companies will get more expensive.
• None of the funds or individuals holding the corporations’ 58,281,800,000 shares of stock will be ruined… unless they deserve it!
• None of the world’s entrepreneurs or executives will stop investing in American businesses.

It’s a good thing raising taxes is an all-around win, because Sherrod Brown is our only hope and soaking The Rich is his only idea.

Follow me on Twitter: @jasonahart

Cross-posted at that hero.