Want to fund education reform? Close Maryland’s corporate tax loopholes

Texas is nobody’s progressive state. Neither are Montana and North Dakota. But here’s something those states have in common: They hold large corporations accountable for paying their fair share of taxes. In fact, that’s kind of a trend. In all, 28 states and the District of Columbia have passed a rule known as “combined reporting” that treats big companies with one or more subsidiaries as a single unit for tax purposes. If that sounds rather dull and dry, that might be the point. Average people don’t follow corporate accounting practices. But here’s why everyone should care: Without combined reporting, companies can hide their profits by shifting them around subsidiaries like a game of Three-Card Monte.