MSNBC "All in with Chris Hayes" - Transcript: Interview with Sen. Elizabeth Warren

Interview

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HAYES:  In 2018, Amazon reported more than $11 billion in taxable income and paid zero dollars in federal taxes and it`s even worse than that.  Amazon is actually getting a federal tax refund of $120 million this year.
 
Now, does that seem wrong to you?  It seems wrong to the Democratic Senator and 2020 Presidential Candidate Elizabeth Warren who has a new plan to impose a seven percent tax on reported corporate profits over $100 million.  The plan would affect about 1,200 companies including Amazon which would have paid nearly $700 million more in taxes just this year.
 
As to economists estimate, Warren`s plan would raise more than $1 trillion over a decade.  And joining me now to tell us more, Massachusetts Senator and Democratic Presidential Candidate Elizabeth Warren.  All right, Senator, obviously there is already a corporate tax and corporate tax rate, it was massively slashed by the Republicans recently, how is this interact with that tax rate?  What does this do?
 
WARREN:  So we`ve got a corporate tax rate, but as you know the thing has just been lobby to death, it`s full of loopholes and breaks and special deals so that a company like Amazon makes $10 billion dollars in profits, can walk away paying nothing in taxes.  That`s just not fair.  Think of all the people out there today who are paying their taxes, families that are doing it, small businesses that are doing it if they can`t take advantage of those loopholes the way that Amazon can.
 
So what I say is when you`re getting out and reporting to your investors, reporting to the public, setting your CEO compensation based on what you say is your after-tax profit, then I think you ought to pay a tax on that.  That means separate from all the loopholes, separate from everything else that happens.
 
The biggest corporations in our country should pay a tax.  You shouldn`t be able to make more than $100 million in profits and pay nothing.
 
HAYES:  OK.  So the idea here is that you`re taking advantage of the fact that it is advantageous for corporations to report lots of profits when talking to investors and very little profit when talking to the government about their tax and tax liabilities --
 
WARREN:  That`s right.
 
HAYES:  -- and basically saying --
 
WARREN:  (INAUDIBLE) two ways.
 
HAYES:  Well, of course.  It`s like you know, it`s like Hollywood Studios who talk about how big a movie opened and then when it`s time to pay off people who have -- or percentage the film made no profit.  So I guess my question is how would -- like would this avoid the same gaming problem?  Are they good at gaming no matter what the rules are?
 
WARREN:  No, because that`s the special part about this proposal.  It says when you get out -- and remember, these statements that they make to the public, these are audited, the SEC --
 
HAYES:  Right, yes.
 
WARREN:  Yes, yes, yes.  When you make that statement, the trick is you don`t get to turn around and say to the IRS oh, but not really.  We only these corporations want to take advantage of every loophole and say no, no, no, that their taxable income is very tiny.
 
If this is their public statement about how well they are doing, then you know, good for you.  I`m glad you`re doing well.  But it means that you need to pay something so everybody else gets a chance to make some investments and do well too.
 
HAYES:  Well, and there`s -- right now, I mean this is -- there`s reporting that says that now twice as many corporations are paying zero taxes under the Republican and Trump tax plan.  Obviously, corporate tax rates have gone down. They were already fairly low in terms of the actual effect of the collected rate, but they were slashed even further.  Would you like to see them go up more broadly?
 
WARREN:  So look, I`m opposed to the Trump tax giveaway.  I think what the Republicans did is terrible.  I think we ought to roll that back.  I think we ought to clean up our tax code.  I think we ought to close a lot of the loopholes.  But I also think that just saying for the biggest companies.
 
Everybody that makes -- remember this, $100 million or more in after-tax income in their publicly reported statements make a contribution, make a payment, make a tax payment so that we can make those investments in the rest of the country.
 
You know, here`s how I look at this.  I`m happy for the corporations that make money, but let`s keep in mind they hired employees, the rest of us helped pay to educate, they got their goods to market on roads and bridges the rest of us helped pay to build.  They were protected by police and firefighters the rest of us also helped to pay for.
 
So what this is about is to say if you have this corporation that is making that much in after-tax profits, put a portion of that back in so that we can rebuild our infrastructure, so that we can invest in universal child care, so that we can reduce the student loan burden, so we can do the things that give the rest of America a chance to really grow and build a prosperous future.
 
HAYES:  You know, you have proposed this, you`ve also proposed a wealth tax which you are on a program to discuss which is very interesting, a novel in many respects.  Two questions, one on a policy one on politics.
 
On policy, at some point do you worry about over taxation right, there`s some threshold at which you start to create perverse incentives or poor incentives depending on where the tax level is relative to current status quo, so do you worry about that?  And politically do you worry that you become too associated with taxes which is not maybe a word that lots of people like?
 
WARREN:  So let me do both halves of this.  The first one is to remember both of these proposals, the wealth tax and the real corporate profits tax both have no exceptions, no loopholes, no lobbying into it.  They`re modest fees but they`re across the board.
 
HAYES:  Right.
 
WARREN:  Two percent on the wealth tax, seven percent of the income tax, just as there it is.  So don`t get fancy, it doesn`t make any difference.
 
HAYES:  Interesting.
 
WARREN:  I`m not trying to twist this part or turn that.  These are very -- you know, that`s just it.  That`s how much you`re going to have to pay if that`s the position you`re in.  And the second, you know, you want to talk politics, understand we`ve already tested of lots of folks.  They`ve already run polls on how do Americans look at the wealth tax.  And the answer is Democrats strongly support it Independents strongly support it, and a majority of Republicans support it.
 
You know, not the Republicans in Washington who are in Congress but Republicans across this country because Americans whether they`re Democrats, Republicans, or Independents, Americans know that the game is rigged and that the big guys are not paying a fair share.  And not just that they`re not paying a fair share, that their failure to do that.  It means everybody else has to pay more and that there`s no money to do the things we need to do in this country, the things we need to do to build a real future in the 21st century.
 
HAYES:  All right, Senator Elizabeth Warren who`s a Massachusetts Senator and running for President at the Democratic nomination.  Thank you so much for joining us tonight.
 
WARREN:  Thank you.

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