California nears financial "meltdown" as revs tumble

By Jim Christie Jim Christie – Wed Jun 10, 7:31 pm ET
Reuters
Underscoring the severity of California's cash crisis, Controller John Chiang, who has previously warned the state's government risks running out of cash without a budget deal, said revenues in May fell by $1.14 billon, or 17.7 percent, from a year earlier...
...The state's revenues from personal income taxes tumbled by 39.3 percent in May from a year earlier while revenues from corporate taxes fell by 52.1 percent and revenues from sales taxes sagged by 7.6 percent, according to a report released by Chiang's office....


Public release date: 9-Apr-2009
University of Kansas
Tax lobbying provides 22,000 percent return to multinational firms, KU researchers find A recent tax law change provided a tax break to the corporations by lowering their tax rate 85 percent on certain worldwide income
LAWRENCE, Kansas — Three professors at the University of Kansas have found that a one-time tax break allowed multinational corporations to receive a 22,000 percent average return on lobbying expenditures.


Obama: Corp. tax-cheats cost $210 billion
Posted May 4, 2009 12:15 PM
by Christi Parsons
President Barack Obama said this morning that he plans to crack down on American companies that legally avoid U.S. tax obligations by investing money in countries with lower tax rates.


Ummmm, yeah, Obama must be going after some low hanging fruit, because $210 billion seems awfully damned low to me.