U.S. President Donald Trump China’s President Xi Jinping arrive for the state dinner with the first ladies at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing, China, Thursday, Nov. 9, 2017. (Thomas Peter/Pool Photo via AP)
The Wall Street Journal dragged President Donald Trump over his economic agenda in a new editorial accusing him of turning Washington, D.C., into “Chinatown.”
“Not long ago it would have been hard to imagine a Republican President demanding government ownership in a private company, but here we are. And now the Trump Administration is toying with a tax on patents too—meaning, a tax on innovation,” began the Journal.
After summarizing the events that led to the federal government taking a 10% stake in Intel, the influential, center-right newspaper predicted that state involvement in the company would hamper Intel’s ability to compete.
“The Administration says the deal won’t include a seat on Intel’s board or ‘governance or information rights,’ and it will mostly vote its shares with Intel’s board. But government
The Journal went on to take further issue with the Trump Commerce Department’s proposal to impose a tax on the value the government believes patents it issues to be worth.
“The idea is for the government to reap some of the reward on an invention. This would reduce the return on innovation, resulting in less of it. That’s what taxes do. But encouraging investment and innovation is why Congress provided full expensing for research and development in the recent tax bill,” it submitted before ominously concluding: “Congress hasn’t authorized such a patent tax, so it isn’t clear the Commerce Department even has the legal power to impose it. But these days that doesn’t seem to matter. Corporate statism is riding high.”