Tax dodger Bono doesn't deserve Constitution Center "Liberty Medal"

Tax dodger Bono doesn't deserve Constitution Center "Liberty Medal"
By Lucy Komisar
Co-chair TJN-USA

Rock star tax dodger Bono (Paul Hewson) and his anti-African-poverty organization last week were given the "Liberty Medal" by The National Constitution Center in Philadelphia, a nonprofit organization established by Congress in 1988 through the Constitution Heritage Act. The award to Bono was extremely inappropriate.

The Center is dedicated to increasing awareness about the Constitution and its relevance in Americans' daily lives. According to the Center's press release, the Liberty Medal reflects the values of the U.S. Constitution - a belief in justice, fairness, self-governance, and a balance between individual rights and communal responsibility.

It is an insult to the Constitution and its values to award a medal to someone who

* Ignores his communal responsibility in his own country to pay his taxes.

* By dishonoring national tax laws and participating in the international tax evasion system dishonors the US Constitution, which in 1913 was amended to provide for the federal income tax.

(The 16th amendment: "The Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes on incomes, from whatever source derived, without apportionment among the several States, and without regard to any census or enumeration.")

Center President and CEO Joseph M. Torsella said at the medal ceremony Sept. 27, "We honor Bono and DATA for leading an urgent conversation, challenging the world's richest nations to do better by Africa, and challenging African nations to do better by their own people. And we honor the way the great conversation about human liberty connects us all, across places and times."

Bono is getting $100,000 which he will donate to his organization, DATA (Debt, AIDS, Trade, Africa). Before you marvel at his generosity, think about the fact that

* Bono participates in the world-wide offshore tax evasion system that is to a large extent responsible for the poverty of Africa. The African Union says tax dodging by foreign companies costs it $150 billion a year - three times what it receives in aid.

The Irish Bono ran his music publishing company in Ireland, where he and his partners took advantage of a law that exempted musicians and artists from taxes on royalties. To dodge taxes on non-royalty income, Bono's interests had the help of offshore nominee directors.

The Irish royalty exemption was begun to aid and reward creative artists, in hopes of encouraging the struggling kind, not to further enrich mega-millionaires like Bono. Last year, the law was changed. From 2007, artists who earn more than $625,450 must pay tax on half their creative income. It hardly seems a harsh measure.

Bono's Dublin company earned $110 million in 2005. Taking profits through the company rather than individually, Bono would have had to pay only 12.5 percent corporate tax, a rate still below that of the local bus conductor or plumber or school teacher.

But that apparently was too much for the man who has homes on the Irish Coast and in the South of France and New York City. So, last year, Bono "moved" the registration of his business to the Netherlands, where it will pay about 5 percent tax on royalties.

Center President and CEO Joseph M. TorsellaThis e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it ought to consider the inappropriateness of this award. So should Senior Director of Public Relations Denise Venuti FreeThis e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it and Public Relations Manager Ashley BerkeThis e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it . The Center's phone numbers are (215) 409-6600 and toll free (866) 917-1787.

Letters to The Independent, an Irish newspaper

Taxing times for Bono
U2 frontman should cop on
Sunday November 25 2007
Sir -- Bono's bizarre predicament was on embarrassing display in Cork last Friday when he sought to defend the decision to move the most profitable part of U2's business out of Ireland to avoid tax after participating in a meeting about tackling world hunger. Mind you, it was more like the theatre of the absurd as the "anti-poverty campaigner" emerged from a meeting of Ireland's Hunger Task Force to face journalists' questions about off-shore tax avoidance, when such activities on a global basis have such a devastating effect on the lives of the world's poor.

Indeed, would millions be dying every year of hunger and preventable diseases if tax havens used by the very rich, including Bono and U2, did not exist? The Tax Justice Network has estimated that the amount of funds held by wealthy individuals in tax havens could generate a staggering $255 billion dollars in additional tax revenue annually -- enough alone to finance the Millennium Development Goals -- which range from halving extreme poverty to halting the spread of HIV/AIDS and providing universal primary education by 2015. That raises a very important question: will the Task Force of which Bono is now a member address how tax havens undermine efforts to fund the life-saving needs of the world's poorest people in preventing hunger?

More specifically, how hundreds of billions are siphoned out of government coffers every year by very rich individuals and multi-national companies using tax havens to avoid tax?

This is especially serious in Africa, where the African Union has estimated that as much as $150bn is lost every year through this form of fiscal abuse -- three times what it receives in aid!

These questions are not presented here as clever debating points. We are entitled to know if the Hunger Task Force will address the fiscal side of the equation in addressing world hunger -- the very real difficulties governments have, in both rich and poor countries, in raising tax revenue to help the poor.

Ronan Tynan,
Booterstown,
Co Dublin


Sir -- Bono the Great is again advising the Irish Government on how to spend the hard earned taxes of the Irish people.

He should cop himself on; as he has avoided paying tax to the Irish Revenue, he should keep his nose out of Irish affairs.

Harry Boland,
Dundalk,
Co Louth