New Year's resolutions

[Janice Shields <jshields@essential.org>]

  	                        NEWS RELEASE
  
  For Release:                Contacts: Ralph Nader and Janice Shields 
  Jan. 1, 1996 
            
                             			  
  
  	             NADER'S NEW YEAR'S RESOLUTION FOR CEOs: 
                               CUT CORPORATE WELFARE
  
  	On Tuesday, December 19, 1995, 91 CEOs signed a letter to 
  President Clinton and all Members of Congress,  which also was printed in 
  major newspapers, calling on the President and Congress to balance the 
  budget.  Consumer Advocate Ralph Nader is responding by sending letters 
  to all of the signatories of the letter asking them, as part of their New 
  Year's resolutions, to identify the federal subsidies and tax 
  expenditures that benefit their corporations and to select the subsidies 
  and tax expenditures that the CEOs agree to begin to forego immediately 
  in order to help balance the budget.  
  
  	According to Ralph Nader, "These so-called free-market executives 
  who demand that the federal budget be balanced should be willing to help 
  eliminate the deficit by cutting their own corporate welfare."
  
  The text of the letter sent to the CEOs follows:
  
  	On Tuesday, December 19, 1995, 91 CEOs signed a letter to 
  President Clinton, House Speaker Gingrich, Senate Majority Leader Bob 
  Dole, Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle, House Majority Leader Dick 
  Armey, House Minority Leader Dick Gephardt and all members of Congress.  
  In the letter, which also appeared in two-page advertisements in the New 
  York Times, Washington Post and Wall Street Journal, you implored 
  Congress to balance the budget.
  
  	To balance the budget, federal expenditures must be reduced and
  federal revenues must be increased.  Spending would fall if corporate
  subsidies were cut and revenues would rise if tax expenditures were
  eliminated.  For example, if Congress abolished only five corporate
  subsidies, $5.12 billion would be saved in fiscal year 1996; these
  subsidies provide government funding for activities that free-market
  proponents would argue should be financed by businesses themselves. (The
  subsidies include those provided by the Export-Import Bank, the Overseas
  Private Investment Corporation, the Export Enhancement Program, the Market
  Promotion Program and the Foreign Military Financing Program.) If Congress
  removed only five corporate tax expenditures, an additional $46.4 billion
  in federal revenue would be generated in fiscal year 1996.  (The tax
  expenditures include accelerated depreciation on equipment and buildings,
  reduced rates on the first $10,000 of corporate taxable income, the
  exception to the source rule for the sale of inventory property, tax
  credits for corporations with income in U.S. possessions and expensing
  rather than amortization of research and development costs.)
  
  	I call on you to validate your appeal for a balanced budget by 
  signing and returning [by January 30, 1996] the enclosed New Year's 
  resolution identifying federal subsidies and tax expenditures that 
  currently benefit your corporation and selecting the subsidies and tax 
  expenditures that your corporation agrees to begin to forego immediately.
  
  The text of the proposed New Year's resolution for CEOs follows:
  
  	          CORPORATE NEW YEAR'S RESOLUTION
  	              ON FEDERAL SUBSIDIES AND 
                            TAX EXPENDITURES
  
  
  	On December 19, 1995, I was one of 91 corporate signatories to a 
  letter supporting a balanced budget, which was sent to President Clinton 
  and all Members of Congress.
  
  	To help balance the budget, I have identified the federal 
  subsidies and tax expenditures that currently benefit my corporation and 
  selected the subsidies and tax expenditures that my corporation agrees to 
  begin to forego immediately.
  
  
                          	###
  
  
  -----
  Janice Shields
  Coordinator, Corporate Welfare Project & TaxWatch
  Center for Study of Responsive Law
  P.O. Box 19367, Washington, DC  20036
  202-387-8030			|   Internet:	jshields@essential.org