A report by the investigative journalism agency ProPublica published on Thursday (4) shows that at least 18 billionaires in the United States received emergency payments from the government in 2020, as part of an aid package for American families created due to the Covid pandemic. 19. Hundreds of other wealthy taxpayers, though not in the billions of dollars worth of assets, also received checks.
According to the agency, among the beneficiaries are Ira Rennert, president and CEO of the Renco Group, which has assets estimated by Forbes at US$3.7 billion, and the Hungarian-American investor and philanthropist George Soros, whose assets total US$8 .6 billion.
According to ProPublica, these payments occurred because the money was automatically sent to US citizens who qualified under rules stipulated by Congress. A $1,200 check was made to single taxpayers who reported earnings of up to $75,000 on their previous tax return, and a $2,400 check was made to couples who reported income of less than $150,000.
The report highlighted that wealthy taxpayers received these stimulus checks for being below the state-determined income threshold: they reported far lower taxable income after using business write-downs to “clean up” their earnings.
ProPublica tracked 270 taxpayers who collectively declared $5.7 billion in revenue, according to their tax returns, but who managed to apply deductions on such a large scale that they qualified to receive stimulus checks.
An example is that of oil tycoon, real estate investor and movie executive producer Timothy Headington, who has a net worth of $1.4 billion: he had revenue of $62 million in 2018, but after $342 million in write-offs, its final result was negative by US$ 280 million.
Rennert and Headington did not respond to ProPublica’s request for information. Soros and his son, Robert, informed through a spokesman that they had returned the checks.
A report by ProPublica itself this year showed that, legally, wealthier Americans can pay income taxes that are only a small fraction of their fortunes.
Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, for example, did not pay income tax between 2007 and 2011. George Soros spent three consecutive years without paying federal income tax. And Tesla founder Elon Musk paid zero in 2018.
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