2 Wisconsin billionaires pay no state income tax in 2010 (guess who)

[hue]

http://www.jsonline.com/business/2-wisconsin-billionaires-enjoy-state-income-taxfree-years-k95sagh-160131345.html


Here's one way to avoid paying state income tax every now and then: Become a billionaire.

It worked for Helen Johnson-Leipold and Diane Hendricks, two of the richest women in the state, both of whom paid zero state income tax in 2010. Johnson-Leipold actually went two consecutive years - 2009 and 2010 - without paying a nickel in state income tax, though a spokeswoman said Johnson-Leipold's state income taxes "averaged in the seven figures" in 2007 and 2008, and her 2011 bill will be in that range.

A Journal Sentinel review of taxes paid by Wisconsin billionaires shows that the state tax bills for the elite group are all over the map - ranging from zero to more than $25 million paid by John R. Menard to the state in 2010.

Menard's tax bill gets an asterisk, as his payment is likely for his personal income as well as the tax obligation for his Menard Inc., the home-supply chain with annual sales estimated at more than $7 billion.

[Iggy]

1. Surprised?

This is rampant across the U.S.

BTW, one of the reasons Greece is circling the toilet, about to go down, is because they
are notoriously bad at collecting taxes- both in the private and public sector. They are
losing $30 Billion per year.

If they simply collected this tax revenue, they wouldn't have to fire state workers, and
they could fund their (generous) retirement benefits.

Failure to collect taxes via tax breaks, tax deferrments, fraud, off shoring, etc. for the
wealthy class means failure for our nation as well.

While the wealthy class demands lower taxes, wealthy S&P companies are sitting on
well over one TRILLION in liquid cash that is not being invested in the U.S. The notion
the wealthy class just has to have low taxes, "in order to create jobs" is just a huge
pile of horsecrap. They have cash NOW, and they are not creating jobs.

[hue]

2. Thanks Iggy for this response! & Welcome to DU!

Actually I'm not surprised, but I posted this because one of the billionaires is the infamous Diane Hendricks who was featured on a video clip as Walker embraced her and she asked him, "Any chance we'll ever get to be a completely red state...?"

[Iggy]

3. Thanks hue

good to be among the living, thinking reasonably crowd!

regarding WI becoming a red state (so its easier for billionaires like Hendricks to
make money)-- it's up to the voters.

the disconnect for me is how supposedly pro union/union people support walker
in significant numbers. also, the voters dumped Sen. Feingold- one of the more
progressive senators we had.