A story in today’s New York Times about the federal Superfund progra observes: “Since 1995, when Congress did not renew a special tax on polluters, the cleanup money has come entirely from taxpayers.” Huh? The money in Superfund always came from “taxpayers” — that is, it has always come from those paying taxes. One might have thought the Times editors would have caught a line discussing taxes that are not paid by taxpayers.
What the article clearly meant to say is that since the special Superfund tax has expired, the program has been funded out of general revenues (though the program does receive funds through cleanup cost recovery as well). Either way, “taxpayers” are footing the bill. The question is whether the cleanup money will come from taxpayers generally, or those who are assessed a special tax on chemical feedstocks. But these latter folks are “taxpayers” too — as they are paying taxes.
The Times also errs in calling it a “tax on polluters.” The Superfund tax was nothing of the kind. It was a tax on chemical feedstocks, not on pollution — and it taxed polluters and non-polluters alike. A company’s tax liability was a function of the volume of taxed substances it used, not the amount of pollution it caused. Thus, a company that used high volumes of taxed substances, but had an exemplary environmental record would pay more than a company that (mis)used far less material and caused more environmental harm. Thus, despite its billing, the Superfund tax was never a “polluter pays” program.
Update: The tax experts at Roth & Company note that the other part of the “Superfund tax” that expired was an across the board tax on corporate Alternative Minimum Tax income in excess of $2 million. As they observe, “Banks, insurance companies and (horrors!) accounting firms were subject to the same ‘superfund tax’ as lead refiners and cyanide makers.” Note the implications: To some environmentalists (and, apparently, some at the Times) a tax on corporate profits is a tax on “polluters.”
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