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Urges Congress to look for long-term tax solutions

On Oct. 7, Gary Salamido, the Chamber’s VP of Governmental Affairs, joined Sen. Kay Hagan and other business leaders in a press conference at Quintiles in RTP on Hagan’s recently introduced Foreign Earnings Reinvestment Act. Other participants included Dennis Gillings of Quintiles, Brooks Raiford of NC Technology Association, Maceo Sloan of NCM Capitol, Steve Winterbottom of Cisco (Chamber Cornerstone member), Bob Hawkins of EMC Corp. (Chamber Cornerstone member), and Jim Whitehurst of Red Hat (Chamber Cornerstone member).

Hagan and Sen. John McCain’s new bill, announced Oct. 6, creates a temporary repatriation holiday to lower the corporate tax rate to allow American companies to bring home trillions in profits held overseas.  Under the current tax structure, American companies that want to bring overseas earning back to the U.S. must pay a 35% tax rate.  This bill would temporarily lower this tax rate to an effective 8.75% to encourage repatriation, with an additional incentive of an even lower 5.25% tax rate if the company grows their domestic payroll during 2012.

“Across the country and here in North Carolina, businesses of all sizes will benefit greatly from a reduced repatriation tax rate. We applaud Senators Hagan and McCain for introducing this legislation. By giving businesses the freedom to bring their earnings back home, the state economy will receive a sorely-needed injection of private sector capital and American businesses will be more competitive in the global economy,” Lew Ebert, President & CEO, of North Carolina Chamber said.

On behalf of the Chamber during Friday’s press conference (10/7), Gary thanked Hagan for her leadership on this issue and for working across party lines to take bold steps vital to helping our businesses succeed and getting our economy back on track.  We keep hearing that North Carolina companies are struggling with where to invest their stretched resources in order to get us out of this unemployment slump.  They need greater certainty and predictability and are unwilling to invest capital or hire more employees until they have this.  This repatriation bill is certainly a welcome and needed step. 

The North Carolina Chamber looks forward to working with Hagan and the rest of the NC Congressional delegation to secure this opportunity and work toward long-term tax reform.  This proposed legislation is a good first start for the short-term, but long-term tax reform is needed to better address certainty, confidence and competitiveness as businesses plan and need predictable tax policies that reach beyond a year.

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