Happy 100th Birthday, Big Oil Tax Breaks

From Think Progress courtesy of BuzzFlash:

Automatic across-the-board budget cuts will take hold on Friday, affecting job growth, state education programs, environmental agencies, and women’s health programs. The sequester actually shares an important anniversary — with Big Oil tax breaks. It is not as well-known a date, but one type of deduction, the percentage depletion allowance, celebrates its 100-year anniversary today.

And

However, congressional Republicans taking the lion’s share of oil and gas industry contributions have refused to close century-old loopholes in order to raise revenue. A number of specialized Big Oil tax breaks allow the top oil companies to cut their tax bill dramatically, sometimes half (or less) of the top corporate rate. It is not as if Big Oil is struggling: Last year, the five largest oil companies — BP, Chevron, ConocoPhillips, and ExxonMobil — earned $118 billion profit at a time when consumers paid record-high gas prices. This haul follows after a year the companies earned a record $137 billion profit.

More here.

We've always had enough money to fund important social programs.  Always.  There is not, nor has there ever been, a Hobson's choice situation about welfare, Social Security, Medicare/Medicaid, and on and on.  The money's out there.  All we have to do is take it.  It wouldn't upend the economy.  It wouldn't cause unemployment or put people out of business.  It wouldn't discourage investors from investing.  All it would do is make life easier and more manageable for millions of working Americans.  It would also allow those Americans to consume more, which would actually improve the economy.  It's a win/win situation.

I mean, it would piss off a bunch of rich and powerful people, the de facto ruling class of the United States, which is why we don't just go and take the money.  But there isn't any other reason besides pissing off rich people to stop us.  The Sequester, deficit hysteria, making government operate like a family budget, it's all bullshit.  We have the money.  But the plutocrats won't let us have it.  

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