If, like me, you count yourself among those who think the big banks have gotten off lightly for the carnage they’ve inflicted on the world’s economy, take heart: Calls for a global tax intervention to curb, or at least mitigate, banks’ risky behaviors are gathering force. The Wall Street Journal today reported that the International Monetary Fund, at the request of the Group of 20 nations, is looking into a new tax that could be imposed on the financial giants to help governments clean up the current mess and head off any future meltdowns. more

Yes, I know they’re calling it a “business net receipts tax” (BNRT), but a value-added tax is essentially what it is. And it’s the core feature of the long-awaited final report issued today by California’s Commission on the 21st Century Economy, which envisages a massive transformation of the state’s corporate and individual tax structures. more

The Tax Foundation, a Washington, DC-based think tank, has released its annual ranking of the “business-friendliness” of state tax systems, based on what it describes as “the taxes that matter most to businesses and business investment: corporate income, individual income, sales, property, and unemployment insurance taxes.”

Top slot on the State Business Tax Climate Index goes to South Dakota, which levies zero corporate or individual income tax. more

The Senate Finance Committee’s version of the great American health-care makeover, unveiled today by Sen. Max Baucus, runs to some 200-plus pages, and if adopted in its present form — a very big if — will cost an estimated $856 billion over the next 10 years.

How would the package affect corporate taxes? more