#34 | The Political Side Of Taxes and Investing Amidst a Looming Recession feat. David Canepa & Demrie Henry

Practical Tax with Steve Moskowitz

Congressional candidate and Bay Area County Supervisor, David Canepa, discusses taxing the top 5% and Financial specialist Demrie Henry makes a both pragmatic and philosophical case for tax avoidance. Episode Transcript Intro: Welcome to the Practical Tax podcast, with tax attorney Steve Moskowitz. The Practical Tax podcast is brought to you by Moskowitz, LLP, a tax law firm. Disclaimer: The information contained in this podcast is based upon information available as of date of recording and will not be updated for changes in law regulation. Any information is not to be considered tax advice or legal advice and does not form an attorney/client relationship. Further, this podcast may be construed as attorney advertising. You should see professional consultation for your individual tax and legal situation. Chip Franklin: Welcome to Practical Tax with tax attorney Steve Moskowitz. Steve, how are you? Steve Moskowitz: Well, I'm looking forward to talking to our next guest. Chip Franklin: Our next guest is a veteran of the San Mateo County Board of Supervisors, and he is also running for Congress. David Canepa. David say hi to Steve. David Canepa: Hey Steve, how are you? Steve Moskowitz: Great, Dave, how are you? David Canepa: Great. Chip Franklin: So let's just, let's jump right into this. David, during COVID you wrote a letter to governor Newsom asking for a pandemic tech tax as groups like Facebook and Amazon were recording record profits. How did that work out? David Canepa: Look, I think, you know, that the governor had mentioned in 2018, clearly that there was interest on looking at a dividend for data and I think the impetus of that was obviously a lot of these tech companies, this before the pandemic, that they were receiving record profits and one of the things that I've seen and I've been a small business owner before I was in politics and I thought it was kind of interesting when I was looking for a job, I created my own job with my own business so that is something that I understand. I think the one thing that I've seen and about fourth generation San Mateo County resident is really, we live in the most prosperous times, but we also have a huge need and a huge need meaning there are people that really don't have that tech skill set and so I'll give you an example. The average home in San Mateo County is $2.8 million okay? The home where my... I grew up in now is $1.9 million. My sister lives there, she's a teacher. My parents bought the home for $90,000 and my dad was a chauffer, for my mom was a bank teller but they were able to afford this American dream. That's out of touch for a lot of folks and so what the pandemic tax was to do, and hopefully the governor will consider it, there's been no movement on it, but is to really make sure that these companies that have record tax, record profits that they're taxed appropriately. As you know, in 20, I think it was 2017, Steve may correct me 2018, the Trump administration moved forward with some pretty aggressive tax cuts, especially around the biotech space and I know the tax rate and I don't know what the exact amount was, but it was really just sort of cut in half. And so I think we can all share in the fruits of our labor. I do believe that big tech has a responsibility. They have tremendous profits. Yes, they've been job creators, but at the same time, we're not talking about a company that's just in the United States, we're talking about companies that are global and I do think there is a responsibility, whether that's through a data dividend or through a tax that it's appropriate and should be reinvested in communities that need it the most. Chip Franklin: Steve, there's a lot here to unpack. Does the government know the tipping point where taxes on corporations begin to hurt the growth of these corporations and thus the jobs and ultimately causing the company to fail or even move locations,