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6/04/2015 8:15 am  #1


support Wolf’s new job-killing energy taxes...

The Wolf Administration asked the Pennsylvania Manufacturing Assoc. (PMA) to support Wolf’s new job-killing energy taxes...
PMA President, David N. Taylor, did not mince words in his response”




Last edited by Common Sense (6/04/2015 8:16 am)


 “We hold these truths to be self-evident,”  former vice president Biden said during a campaign event in Texas on Monday. "All men and women created by — you know, you know, the thing.”

 
 

6/04/2015 10:20 am  #2


Re: support Wolf’s new job-killing energy taxes...

According to a comprehensive study and report by Sourcewatch, here are the reasons some industries and politicians oppose energy taxes:


Taxes defeated in part by industry study
Pennsylvania remains the largest U.S. state without a tax on natural gas production, due in part to a 2009 Pennsylvania State University study predicting drillers would shun Pennsylvania if new taxes were imposed; lawmakers cited it the following year when they rejected a 5 percent tax proposed by then-Governor Ed Rendell. The tax would have generated an estimated $100 million in its first year. It was later reported that the PSU study was sponsored by the industry-funded Marcellus Shale Coalition, which provided a grant of about $100,000, and led by economist Dr. Tim Considine, the lead analyst for natural gas deregulation on the U.S. Congressional Budget Office, according to his University of Wyoming profile. Considine has also conducted contract research for industry groups such as the American Petroleum Institute and the Wyoming Mining Association.[10] A 2010 expansion of the 2009 PSU study was funded by the American Petroleum Institute.[11]

The impact fee will bring in about $85 million in 2012 compared to $200 million under a 5 percent tax, assuming a gas price of $2.50 per thousand cubic feet, according to the non-partisan Pennsylvania Budget and Policy Center. The fee will peak at about $200 million a year, while the tax could have reached $500 million in 2015 if gas prices rebound to $4.50.[12]

Considine was also the lead author on a SUNY-Buffalo report in May 2012 that claimed state regulation had made fracking safe in Pennsylvania. Within days, a top Pennsylvania environmental official quoted the Buffalo study in testimony to Congress about the effectiveness of fracking regulations. But both the official and the study itself declined to mention Considine’s close ties to the industry — and that his department had received nearly $6 million in donations from the oil and gas industry in 2011.[13] A separate PSU study on fracking also funded by the Marcellus Shale Coalition was cancelled in 2012 after after some faculty members said the project was being slanted toward industry.[14]

Tax loopholes
According to the Pennsylvania Budget and Policy Center, more than 400 corporate subsidiaries linked to Marcellus Shale gas exploration have been registered in Delaware, most within the last four years; more than two-thirds of the companies in the Marcellus Shale Coalition are registered to a single address: 1209 North Orange Street. In 2004, the Center estimated that the Delaware loophole had cost the state $400 million annually in lost revenue.[15] SEIU of Pennsylvania has calculated $550 million/year in lost tax revenue in the state from the shale gas industry due to the loophole.[16]

Lobbying and donations
A 2012 press release by MarcellusMoney.org stated that the "natural gas industry and related trade groups have now given nearly $8 million to Pennsylvania state candidates and political committees since 2000.... Top recipients of industry money given between 2000 and April 2012 were Governor Tom Corbett (R) with $1,813,205.59, Senate President Joseph Scarnati (R-25) with $359,145.72, Rep. Dave Reed (R-62) with $137,532.33, House Majority Leader Rep. Mike Turzai (R-28) with $98,600, and Sen. Don White (R-41) with $94,150.[17]

The 2011 Common Cause report, "Deep drilling, deep pockets, in Washington and Pennsylvania," found that "from 2001 through June 2011, the fracking industry gave $20.5 million to current members of Congress and spent $726 million on lobbying."

Two Pennsylvanians, Rep. Tim Murphy, and Sen. Pat Toomey, ranked among the leading recipients in Congress in gas industry donations (10th and 28th respectively). Murphy has received $275,499 and Toomey $160,750. Other PA recipients included Rep. Jason Altmire (D) with $65,365; Rep. Jim Gerlach (R) with $60,800; Rep. Bill Shuster (R) with $59,000; Rep. Charles Dent (R) with $56,500; and Rep. Glenn Thompson (R) with $52,000.

The natural gas industry contributed about $1.6 million to Gov. Corbett’s political campaigns from 2001 to 2011, about $1.1 million of that for his campaign for governor.[18]

Revolving door
The 2013 Public Accountability Initiative report "Fracking and the Revolving Door in Pennsylvania" identified 45 current or former Pennsylvania state officials who have links to the energy industry and gas drilling and fracking regulation, including 28 who have left to take industry jobs. According to the report:

Pennsylvania’s previous three governors have strong ties to the natural gas industry - Tom Ridge’s firms benefited from a $900,000 contract to lobby for the Marcellus Shale Coalition, Mark Schweiker joined a lobbying firm with a Marcellus Shale practice, and Ed Rendell is a partner in a private equity firm invested in fracking services companies and recently lobbied on behalf of driller Range Resources. Current governor Tom Corbett received more than $1 million in campaign contributions from the oil and gas industry.
Every Secretary of Environmental Protection since the DEP was created has had business ties to the natural gas industry.
Twenty Department of Environmental Protection employees have held jobs in the energy industry either before or after their agency jobs. Former high-level staffers include Terry Bossert, who has worked for three law firms that represent the energy industry before being hired as a vice president at Chief Oil & Gas; John Hines, a former Executive Deputy Secretary, who is now a government relations advisor to Shell; and Barbara Sexton, a former Executive Deputy Secretary who is now a government affairs director at Chesapeake Energy.

Last edited by Rongone (6/04/2015 10:22 am)

 

6/04/2015 10:26 am  #3


Re: support Wolf’s new job-killing energy taxes...

"Job Killing Taxes".
I just love labels.


We live in a time in which decent and otherwise sensible people are surrendering too easily to the hectoring of morons or extremists. 
 

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