Lawmakers back one-year windfall tax on oil companies

http://www.jsonline.com/bym/news/nov05/370956.asp

Washington - In a sign of the political impact of soaring energy prices, the Republican-controlled Senate Finance Committee voted on Tuesday to impose a $5 billion tax next year on the nation's biggest oil companies.


The measure amounts to a one-year windfall profits tax, a concept that most Republicans had until recently denounced as a discredited idea from the 1970s. It was added to a larger bill that would cut taxes by about $61 billion over the next five years.

Conservative Senate Republicans who support the oil industry bitterly protested the measure, noting that Congress had just approved billions in new tax breaks to encourage oil and gas exploration. But every Republican voted for the overall package, which passed the committee by 14-8 and which the full Senate is expected to take up today.

There's nothing hidden in there that will give them 8 billion of tax breaks for the 5 billion they pay?

and I assume a Republican bill would include this as well. What really concerns me are the unrelated tax breaks for exploration. If business is so good they can pay for this themselves. That what the so called "free market" is all about.

This year's election results were not what the Reps expected (except in Ohio where they control the returns) so they are starting to sweat 2006. I think these measures are grandstanding. If they were serious about the welfare of the country, they would do some serious work on the deficit like raise taxes, universal health care and getting us the fuck out of Iraq.

The oil companies have fleeced us before, why should they get these breaks?

After the cigarette companies were sued, the price of smokes didn't drop... they went up.

If a tax is imposed on the oil companies the cash will just flow into a huge trough with bureaucratic pigs surrounding it. The price of gas will remain high ...or go up.

In the 60s there were MANY small oil companies competing for business. The gas stations checked your oil, cleaned your windshield, and gave away incentives. Since then the many companies merged into the FIVE conglomerates we saw before the Senate last week.

While watching that I realized that it probably wasn't the first time those five execs sat together in a meeting.

I don't think tax penalties would be as effective as government oversight of industries that are vital to life in America.

Re-regulate and diversify:
Oil
Food
telecommunication
Broadcast media

Monopolies hurt consumers.

Monopolies hurt consumers. - A duh, you'd think we'd have learned that lesson in the beginning of the last century or during the GREAT DEPRESSION!!!