“[Obama’s 2013 budget] calls for raising taxes on oil and natural gas companies by more than $85 billion.”
The American Petroleum Institute’s Brian Johnson writes in the Washington Times:
… The good news is America’s oil and natural gas industry now supports more than 9.2 million jobs and delivers more than $86 million a day in revenue to the federal government. We pay more than our fair share in taxes with an effective rate nearly double the average for all industries. In 2010, we contributed more than $470 billion to the U.S. economy in spending, wages and dividends, a sum more than half the size of the president’s own 2009 federal stimulus package.
We are one of few industries that have continued to create jobs during the economic downturn. Hundreds of thousands of new jobs related to oil and natural gas development have been created recently in North Dakota, Pennsylvania, Texas and other oil and natural gas states, and where the industry has a strong presence, household incomes have been rising.
And with the right policies we could do even more.
Unfortunately, in his budget plan for fiscal year 2013, the president proposed policies that would make extending these successes more difficult. His budget calls for raising taxes on oil and natural gas companies by more than $85 billion.
A tax hike of this magnitude would discourage investment in new U.S. oil and natural gas projects – or direct it overseas – resulting in fewer new American jobs, less domestic energy, diminished energy security, a higher trade deficit, and eventually, less revenue for our government…