Look Who’s Protecting Rich Private Jet Owners
The White House and Senate Democrats. That’s who:
Listening to the White House, you’d think the key to averting the across-the-board spending cuts (the dreaded “sequester”) set to in place on March 1 is closing the tax break for owners of private jets.
Here was White House Press Secretary Jay Carney last week:
“How do you explain to a senior that we’re doing this, asking you to sacrifice, but we’re not saying that corporate jet owners should lose their special tax incentive.”
On Wednesday, Carney summed up the Republican position this way: “We’d rather see our national security undermined than corporate jet owners, God forbid, give up their tax break.”
And President Obama in an interview Wednesday with KAKE-TV in Wichita: “What we don’t want to do is give somebody who’s buying a corporate jet an extra tax break.”
Carney has brought up the corporate jet tax break at every single briefing this week.
Listening to the White House, you might think that the “balanced” Democratic plan to avert the spending cuts would close that loophole for private jets.
But you would be wrong.
The Senate Democratic plan – which has been endorsed by the White House and is, in fact, the only Democratic plan actively under consideration right now – doesn’t touch corporate jets.
The story goes on to note that ending the tax break would only raise a minuscule amount of money—which has been pointed out more than once in discussions regarding the emptiness and cynicism of faux-White House/Democratic rage over tax breaks for private jets. The only reason a tempest arose in this particular teacup was that the Obama administration and the rest of the Democratic party thought that it was more important to engage in class warfare than to enact responsible fiscal policies. And now we learn that neither the administration nor its allies in the Senate could even live up to their class warfare rhetoric.
And people wonder why Americans get cynical about politics.
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Comments:
Jun '12
Re: Look Who’s Protecting Rich Private Jet Owners
"The Senate Democratic plan – which has been endorsed by the White House and is, in fact, the only Democratic plan actively under consideration right now – doesn’t touch corporate jets."
Then there's at least one thing in this bill I can go along with. If Republicans were smart they'd surround themselves with the working families that build corporate jets and accuse Democrats of destroying high paying jobs.
Aug '10
Re: Look Who’s Protecting Rich Private Jet Owners
This is picture of Nancy Pelosi's jet when she was Speaker .
Any questions ?
Dec '12
Re: Look Who’s Protecting Rich Private Jet Owners
Then there's at least one thing in this bill I can go along with. If Republicans were smart they'd surround themselves with the working families that build corporate jets and accuse Democrats of destroying high paying jobs.
YESSS!!! This is the perfect indication that Democrats don't really care about "jobs" or "the economy" at all, only preserving their own power. In 2008, when Obama and his minions vilified the CEO's coming to Washington in corporate jets, the market tanked for those MADE-IN-AMERICA, very high-value-added items. The city of Wichita alone lost thousands of jobs at Cessna and Hawker-Beechcraft; the company I work for lost 20% of its business in a couple of months.
May '12
Re: Look Who’s Protecting Rich Private Jet Owners
No way dems do anything to restrict private jets. How else are they gonna get to the Dominican Republic to chase hookers?
Dec '10
Re: Look Who’s Protecting Rich Private Jet Owners
The auth0r Michael Crichton once suggested an excellent first step to combat global warming: ban all private jets in the United States.
Think about it. Those small jets burn an enormous amount of fuel to carry a dozen or so people. It's a great way to make the rich pay their fair share because only a tiny segment of the population would even be affected. Millionaires and billionaires. Corporate fat-cats. Wall Street execs. Hedge fund managers.
Rich liberal movie stars. All the other artsy, fabulously wealthy lefty elite.
Do you think we can convince the greenie faction of the Hollywood left to join us in supporting a ban on all private jets in the US?
Edited on February 22, 2013 at 7:10amApr '11
Re: Look Who’s Protecting Rich Private Jet Owners
Starve the Beast: The auth0r Michael Crichton once suggested an excellent first step to combat global warming: ban all private jets in the United States.
Think about it. Those small jets burn an enormous amount of fuel to carry a dozen or so people. It's a great way to make the rich pay their fair share because only a tiny segment of the population would even be affected. Millionaires and billionaires. Corporate fat-cats. Wall Street execs. Hedge fund managers.
Rich liberal movie stars. All the other artsy, fabulously wealthy lefty elite.
Do you think we can convince the greenie faction of the Hollywood left to join us in supporting a ban on all private jets in the US?
But without private jets how are movie stars supposed to escape California taxes and regulations to produce their leftist propaganda films in low tax states?
Oct '11
Re: Look Who’s Protecting Rich Private Jet Owners
It's a great way to make the rich pay their fair share because only a tiny segment of the population would even be affected. Millionaires and billionaires. Corporate fat-cats. Wall Street execs. Hedge fund managers.
Rich liberal movie stars. All the other artsy, fabulously wealthy lefty elite.
I see. So the workers who make the jets, the mechanics who service the jets, the caterers who provision the jets, the aircrew who fly the jets, the companies that support theses workers and all their families, count for nothing. A multi-billion dollar industry should just be snuffed out for political reasons. Liberty is dead.
Edited on February 22, 2013 at 7:37amRe: Look Who’s Protecting Rich Private Jet Owners
This is a plan I can go along with.
FloppyDisk90: "The Senate Democratic plan – which has been endorsed by the White House and is, in fact, the only Democratic plan actively under consideration right now – doesn’t touch corporate jets."
Then there's at least one thing in this bill I can go along with. If Republicans were smart they'd surround themselves with the working families that build corporate jets and accuse Democrats of destroying high paying jobs. · 7 hours ago
Jul '11
Re: Look Who’s Protecting Rich Private Jet Owners
If you can't cut tax breaks for cooporate jet owners what can we cut? Beyond the normal depriciation allowances, etc., why should they get an extra break?
Jun '11
Re: Look Who’s Protecting Rich Private Jet Owners
What is the tax break we are talking about? Is there something special about corporate jets or are corporations allowed to deduct these jets as conventional business expenses? There is a difference between a private individual using a private jet to get to LA for a vacation and a person flying on business.
Feb '11
Re: Look Who’s Protecting Rich Private Jet Owners
Of the thousands of articles about these "tax breaks," very few actually say anything about what specific tax policy they are referring to. But apparently, this is all about accelerated depreciation...ie, allowing the same accelerated depreciation treatment for *business* aircraft that is available for other business equipment.
I don't think most people understand how depreciation works, quite likely Obama himself doesn't. Under accrual accounting, the "profit" on which a company pays taxes isn't cash profit, but an accounting construct. If you buy a piece of equipment for $100,000 and have total revenues of $350,000 and other expenses (other than the $100K equipment purchase) of $250K, then you might think that your taxable profit would be $350K-$250K-$100K, which is zero...but it doesn't work that way. You are not (generally) allowed to deduct the full $100K of the asset purchase from taxable income, but must depreciate it over multiple years. In essence, you are paying taxes on profits you have not (in a cash sense) yet made.
The accelerated depreciation provisions included in various tax bill create exceptions allowing more (sometimes all) of the purchase cost to be expensed up front.
Re: Look Who’s Protecting Rich Private Jet Owners
Whether or not they should, the issue here is (a) tax breaks for corporate jet owners cost exceedingly little for the government; and (b) those inveighing against tax breaks for corporate jet owners have proposed no actual legislation to increase those rates or close any loopholes.