Word: taxing
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...that sum is a drop in the bucket when one considers the size of the American economy. We should not, however, be overwhelmed simply because the task of lowering carbon emissions is so large. Investing some of the endowment in new initiatives or in establishing Harvard as a carbon-tax test scenario obviously won’t solve the problem alone. But just because these efforts have no guarantee of concrete success does not mean they are not worthy undertakings. The entire nation will have to make sacrifices for us to really combat carbon emissions, but it can start...
...already paid—and continues to pay—its social debts in kind, so to speak; that the work the University does in educating young people and contributing to the world’s research constitutes an unquantifiable sum far beyond what we might provide with a tax from the endowment. “If the endowment were smaller, we would have to do less,” she noted, and then connected this “less” to a string of unassailable endeavors: stem cell research, public service schools, the arts, global engagement, and sustainability...
...first address at commencement, the University’s most symbolically significant ceremony of the year. The historian chose in this historical moment not to make an abstract address about the location of Harvard and its students in the world, but instead to present a political case for the tax-exempt status of the endowment. It was, all told, an eloquent and well-argued speech, drawing a clever equivalence between the strength of our ledger books and the munificence of our deeds. But in choosing to dedicate her speech to warding off the specter of taxation, President Faust betrayed...
...nobody ever suggests that these corporations should not be taxed. The reason, of course, is that they are private institutions whose day-to-day operations are accountable only to their shareholders, even when the consequences of those operations are socially beneficial. Our basic political assumptions about the interface between the private and public spheres of interest require these corporations to formally support the work of the common good through the mechanism of taxes. This is a mechanism that has its share of functional problems. But it is the best mechanism we have, and Americans—including most academics?...
That’s not to say Harvard should be taxed at standard corporate tax rates and its funds be deposited into the government’s general accounts. One good compromise would tax the endowment at a lenient rate and use the funding exclusively for public higher education. Such a program would redirect a sliver Harvard’s income in a way that would still, in Faust’s words, “enable students and faculty of both today and tomorrow to search for new knowledge...