Last Saturday, Forecasting Rain attended a protest in Harvard Square in Cambridge, MA. The target was Bank of America--they, like many of the nations largest and more profitable companies, payed little in taxes last year. In some cases, they paid none. BOA is one of those cases. In fact, the bank netted after taxes the same number of federal dollars it would take to cover the cuts Obama proposed for LIHEAP (heating oil subsidies for the poor).
There were protests staged internationally (US and UK), including one particularly interesting sit-in at a BOA in D.C. The movement began in the UK, where they have been fairly successful in getting onto the political agenda that idea that putting pressure on large corporations to pay their proper share should take the place of steep austerity measures. Here is the UK website, the US website, and the Twitter accounts for the US and Boston (a more comprehensive list of local contacts can be found here).
Here is a fact sheet on BOA's tax dodging (word doc).
And here are some pictures!
If you are interested in finding out more about this movement, please let me know, as I am sure there are plenty more of these protests to come.
UPDATE: Looks like Glenn Beck has sniffed out the conspiracy here!
UPDATE II: There are a bunch of pictures of us on the Nation's website!
There were protests staged internationally (US and UK), including one particularly interesting sit-in at a BOA in D.C. The movement began in the UK, where they have been fairly successful in getting onto the political agenda that idea that putting pressure on large corporations to pay their proper share should take the place of steep austerity measures. Here is the UK website, the US website, and the Twitter accounts for the US and Boston (a more comprehensive list of local contacts can be found here).
Here is a fact sheet on BOA's tax dodging (word doc).
And here are some pictures!
If you are interested in finding out more about this movement, please let me know, as I am sure there are plenty more of these protests to come.
UPDATE: Looks like Glenn Beck has sniffed out the conspiracy here!
UPDATE II: There are a bunch of pictures of us on the Nation's website!
