Rangel hoping for tax reform talk in State of the Union

“If corporations were willing to make certain that the tax loopholes that we have throughout the system are closed, there’s no reason why we couldn’t bring the corporate level down to 25 percent or maybe even lower in order to compete with other countries,” Rangel said.

The corporate tax rate in the United States – 35 percent – is scheduled to soon be the highest in the developed world. At a House Ways and Means hearing last week, the chief executive of Procter & Gamble said the current rate was hurting American competitiveness, adding that he believed a tax code overhaul shouldn’t necessarily be revenue-neutral at first. 

The president has said that competitiveness will be a major theme of Tuesday’s State of the Union and is expected by some observers to discuss tax reform. Interested parties have said they think the speech may give clues as to how strong a push the administration will make for tax reform.