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Letter: It's an odd time to champion a corporate giveaway

(Jose Luis Magana | The Associated Press) People walk outside the Capitol as Senate Republicans work to pass their sweeping tax bill this week, in Washington, Thursday, Nov. 30, 2017.

If Senate and House Republicans really want to help the middle class, they should direct tax reductions directly to the middle class instead of passing them through big corporations and the wealthy.

Of course they won’t do that because their intent all along has been to provide tax breaks to their donor base, the aforementioned mega corporations and America’s highest earners. Beneficiaries will include the likes of casino magnate Sheldon Adelson, the Koch brothers, and Berkshire Hathaway’s Warren Buffett, who, incidentally, doesn’t even want the cuts. The Trump empire also stands to gain financially from the corporate tax reductions, not to mention the eventual elimination of the inheritance tax.

And why tax cuts for large corporations now? Most are enjoying record profits with plenty of money stashed in tax havens outside the U.S. Executive salaries are at an all-time high and shareholders are seeing nice increases in their stock portfolios. It strikes me that the time for tax cuts for big corporations ought to occur during difficult economic times when companies are struggling. That’s certainly not the case now.

Finally, we’ve had to listen to the GOP whine incessantly during the Obama administration about runaway Democratic spending and the size of the national debt. So why aren’t Republicans even talking about adding $1.5 trillion to the national debt over 10 years to fund their corporate giveaway? Seriously.

Michael Norman, Cottonwood Heights