Director's Cut

>> We're broke. America's broke. >> We're broke. >> We're broke. >> We're broke. >> We're broke. We don't have the money anymore. >> Thousands of Pasco County school employees are waiting for word on who will lose their jobs this week. >> State legislatures looking to cut budgets are increasingly targeting the courts which have been forced to lay off thousands of staff workers. >> Up to 80 police officers may be laid off by the end of June. >> Washington's just obsessed with cutting spending. Everyone's talking about cuts, and no one's talking about where the money's going to come from. >> We're a wealthy country. We're not broke. The money's there. We're just not looking in the right places. >> Hi, welcome to Director's Cut. I'm guest host Pete Schwaba, and that was a clip from the film "We're Not Broke," a documentary about U.S. corporations that avoid paying income tax, and the effect it's having on our country. We're joined today by one-half of the film's producer/director team, Karin Hayes. Karin, thanks for being here. >> Thanks so much, Pete. >> So, I have to ask, are we broke, and if so, why? >> Well, no. Many people would think that we are, but we're talking about the U.S. here, and the reality is that multinational companies have so much money that they have stashed in offshore tax havens overseas, that if we were to bring back that money, it would put in a huge amount of revenue into our treasury. >> Okay, so that's where all the money is. That's why we're broke, you're saying. >> Yeah, we're saying that we're not broke. People are saying, we're broke, we're broke, we're broke. But we're saying, actually we're not, because there's this whole stash of revenue that we're not actually collecting. >> Okay, sure. So, I was looking at your resume and some of the films you've done. This is kind of different for you, something like this. I'm curious. As a documentarian, you've got so many clips in here, news outlets, interviews, people on the street, and protest groups, how hard is it to tell this story, as opposed to other documentaries you've done? Is it hard to kind of get a through line or narrative there? >> Yeah, this story was particularly hard, because when we started out, the idea from our executive producer, he came to us and said, would you like to do a story about offshore tax havens. And you know, we didn't know anything about the subject. We've been dealing with films about hostages in Colombia. So we said, okay, we'll go down this road. As we started researching and doing interviews, we started peeling back the layers of what was actually the issue going on here. We were talking to people, we thought first we were going to do things about individuals hiding money overseas, and then it became clear to us that the larger issue was corporations and how they were able to transfer profits overseas, while making tons of profits, transfer them overseas and not pay any taxes on it. So, going into how are we going to make this an interesting story was a completely big challenge for us, actually. You know, you talk to someone about taxes, I'd say, oh, I'm doing this film about taxes, and my friend's eyes would glaze over and they'd start to get really worried about, you know, oh, my gosh, I've got to pay my own taxes. So, it wasn't really an interesting subject to many people that we talked to. Then, as we were going along, we discovered the US Uncut people, which helped bring some life to the story. >> That kind of leads me to my next question. How hard is it? When you make a film, you have to know how to make a film. It seems like now you have to know a lot about taxes, and corporate ledgers, and all that. How much homework did you have to do, just on the financial end of it? >> Well, we were really lucky because we were able to draw a lot of data from organizations like Citizens for Tax Justice, and other places. Even, we were looking at statements that banks were putting out themselves. We had tax experts and attorneys looking at things. We didn't do the number crunching ourselves, it was the experts who did that. We relied on their data to help get all the facts and figures. >> Probably a good idea. >> We were not about to start number crunching. That's a whole other career. >> All right, well let's see another clip from "We're Not Broke." >> Schools are laying off teachers left and right. Everything that made America what America is, is suffering. It's plain and simple greed. >> General Electric, one of the giants of American businesses, is on the hot seat tonight because of its 2010 tax bill. Zero. >> US Uncut protests over the weekend. They again went after the Bank of America, because apparently they have a huge amount of profits and they don't pay much taxes. >> If they want to do business here, they have to pay taxes here, that's just how it goes. >> Exxon Mobil, the largest oil company in the world, made $19 billion in profits in 2009, paid no federal income taxes. If you're a working stiff, you're making $30,000, $40,000 a year, you're paying taxes, but if you're Chevron and you made $10 billion in profits in 2009, you don't have to pay any taxes. Citigroup made more than $4 billion in profits, but paid no federal income taxes. >> If one sector of the U.S. economy is paying less, then either we run larger deficits or others are asked to pay more. >> It just shifts the burden to the average honest taxpayer. That's what's so totally offensive, and so totally unacceptable here. >> We're talking with Karin Hayes, producer/director of "We're Not Broke." Karin, when you do something like this, I remember reading that GE paid no taxes, and made billions of dollars, and you know, kind of raising my eyebrows. You did a lot more than that. You made a film about it. What was the tipping point for you? What made you say, I've got to make a movie about this? >> Well, initially, we had never thought of this topic. Our executive producer, Charles Davidson, came to us and said would you make a film about offshore tax havens. The way that I approach documentary films is, you know, is this a subject that I think has potential for a story, and is it something that I could be interested in. It was something that I had never considered before. Both Victoria and myself thought, you know, this is really interesting. We never really thought about this. You know, you hear the Cayman Islands, different things like that, as the offshore tax havens, but to really delve into it and see what's going on sounded fascinating. So we went down a few different roads before we ended up with the film that we have now. We were following different stories, and those didn't pan out, and so we ended up with this one, with the multinational corporations. >> Right, I've got $22 in an offshore tax haven.

Karin laughs

The film is pretty non-partisan. I mean, you really do kind of go after just politicians in general. But regardless of what side you're on, I was thinking while I was watching this, you're going to be angry. >> Right. >> Was that your goal, to really rile people up on both sides? >> Yeah, I mean, we approached it as a non-partisan film, because it's not a partisan issue. Both sides take money from corporations for their campaigns and get lobbied by corporations to do certain things. So, whether you're republican, democrat, independent, whatever, it doesn't matter, because we are all being affected by what the multinational corporations are doing, or not doing. >> Right. So, as a filmmaker, you've got this film, and you want to show it to as many people as possible, obviously, but you know, people that work minimum wage jobs and raise kids aren't going to film festivals, typically, in my experience. So, how do you get your film seen by all these people you think are being affected by this process? >> You're right. We started out with some festivals. It premiered at the Sundance Film Festival, which was great. Then it's continuing to go to a number of festivals around the country and the world. What we've been able to do is, one thing, our executive producer Charles, is very interested in having people see the film, so at a certain point, we partnered up with Sundance Artist Services and New Video, and they did a lot of digital deals for us with Hulu and other things. We said let's just get the film out for free. Let's put it on Hulu for free, at a certain point, you know, so many people could see it. Then another thing was, we're doing a lot of community screenings. We partnered with organizations who are able to get the film out. They can host a screening in their community, with their church, with their organization, whatever. That's another way. Also, universities and libraries, we have an educational distributor, Roco Films Educational. Those are ways that people, we're trying to make it as accessible as possible. Now, with Wisconsin Public Television, which is great, because it's our first television broadcast in the United States. >> You hear that? That's great. It's great to have you here. I was curious though, real quickly, and then we'll go to another clip. The guy writing IRS. How much B-roll did you shoot during this, because you've got all this news footage and people. Did you have to do a lot of that kind of stuff to make the film? >> We did do a lot of B-roll shooting ourselves. We also were so lucky, because many of the US Uncut people, they sent us footage from their actions. We also found other sources, people who had uploaded their film on a site that you can license their clips. So, we were able to tap into a lot of different sources to be able to put the film together. It took a lot of footage. >> Right, well, let's see another clip from "We're Not Broke." >> The fact that I pay more income taxes than a multi-billion dollar corporation that has trillions dollars of assets and got bailed out is just unbelievable. You get really angry, but you also get really inspired. You're like, oh, that's what's going wrong! That's why we're laying off police officers and teachers. It's not just that government doesn't work, it's that government doesn't work if you don't pay your fair share. >> The movement is called Uncut and it's modeled after a grassroots effort in the United Kingdom that publicizes companies that avoid paying taxes-- >> I read this article about UK Uncut in The Nation magazine, "How to built a Progressive Tea Party."

crowd shouting

>> People's homes are being closed. Homeless services are being cut. >> People in this country are incredibly angry. UK Uncut actions have basically involved people around the country using social media to-- >> I immediately get on Facebook and start a group. I sent it out to a bunch of my friends. A little while later I notice this person Joanne Gifford online. She was like this really level-headed, reasonable person. She's a soccer mom from Napa, California. >> I read the article in The Nation and I was so jacked up about it that I went right to Facebook to create a group, and I'll be darned if Ryan wasn't a step ahead of me. >> Joanne sees this guy, Carl from Mississippi, on our site. Carl is posting all over the Facebook page. >> I started a Facebook group, webpage, Twitter account. I just intended this for people in Jackson, Mississippi to have a local protest. Then folks all around the country said, I'm going to do something in my community, too. >> We're talking with Karin Hayes, the producer/director of "We're Not Broke." You have a partner, Victoria. Tell us a little bit about her. And what's it like working with a partner? Do you think it's easier or harder? I have a partner, so I know it can be tough at times. Tell us about your relationship with Victoria. >> We've been working together now, I think, about 11 years. Our first film that we did was "The Kidnapping of Ingrid Betancourt," about a woman running for president of Colombia who got kidnapped by FARC guerillas. We continued down this road of hostages in Colombia, and we did another film called "Pip

and Zastrow

An American Friendship," about a Black and White man who became friends during segregation. >> I love that title. >> In Annapolis. We've had a range of different stories. I think, for us, it's great to work together, because we are very different people. We're almost complete opposites. It causes friction sometimes when we completely disagree about something, but I think ultimately, our strengths work together and we challenge each other, and the final product is better, in my opinion. >> You complement each other. >> I think so, yeah, even though there's those struggles and fights through the way. >> If she was here, she'd be wearing a black top with red pants. >> Right! >> It's interesting, when the guy from US Uncut goes in and starts yelling at everybody, I just kind of thought it was funny, because nobody seems riled. They all just kind of look at the guy, and they're like, check him out. Do you think these corporations, I don't want you to answer for them, but do you think that what they're doing, they think is unfair? Do they think what they're doing is totally, you know, okay? >> Well, technically, it's legal, what they're doing. It's part of our legal system that has been passed through Congress. They are allowed to do the things that they're doing. The question that we raise later in the film though, is what's necessarily legal isn't always necessarily right. You know, you look back in history at slavery, or at Apartheid, or child labor in the US. Those things were legal, but is it right, that's kind of the question that we raise in the film for people to discuss. >> Sure, do you have, when you're making a film like this, do you have to kind of almost put yourself, you know, into the position of these corporate multinationals that put money overseas, and say, are they right? Do you have to kind of get to know the enemy, so to speak? >> I definitely thought about it a lot, and you know, nobody, as one of the people in our film, Edward Klienbard, he is a tax attorney. He teaches at USC. He worked in the corporate world for a long time. He says, you know, nobody likes to pay lots of taxes. But he said, you know, but I also don't want to live in a government that's equivalent to a 15th century government, where you have no services, everything's being cut. That, I think, is what's happening. We see the austerity measures and cuts taking place. And a lot of it is because there's not enough revenue to support the spending that we have. So I think on one hand, yes, I can see where the corporations are going. Of course, if it's legal, they don't want to pay more. You know, they want to make as much profit. But I begin to question, you know, at a certain point, how much profit do people need, and what about the society you're living in, and giving back to that society. It's a question that I think more people are beginning to think about, as many more people are, you know, falling out of the middle class and struggling, and then companies are having record profits, which is, there's something going on here. >> You're saying there's like a connection between the two. >> Yeah, I think so. I think that, you know, you look at it, and as the gap is growing, we hear about the gap between wealth and poverty is growing greater, but project that 20-30 years in the future. I mean, what kind of society are we living in? >> Interesting, yeah. Well, let's see another clip from "We're Not Broke." >> If you live in Washington, D.C. long enough you know that the corporate multinationals pretty much own Congress. We give you campaign money, you get yourself elected, you help us hide our money offshore and not pay our taxes. >> Congress is totally motivated and controlled by money. If you talk to individual members you'll find that they're sensible folks mostly, and they know what the problems are. They can say, oh, yes, yes, this is a problem. This is a problem. We must do something about this. And then the next sentence will be, but we can't. 'Cause. 'Cause why? Business doesn't want it. >> Lower the corporate tax rates, broaden the base. I guess, sir, I want to know, is this really on the table and when? People are so anxious in business, in the investment community. What can you tell us? >> I sure hope it's on the table. I'm going to put it on the table in the ways and means committee as chairman, because I think it's just so critical. Our tax code is too complex, too inefficient, too burdensome, too high. Money Money Money can buy you Silk and sable >> Senate Democrats failed to pass a bill Tuesday that would punish companies for shifting jobs overseas. A bipartisan filibuster is to blame for the legislation's collapse. Why, oh why Oh, tell me why Ain't there something That money can't buy? Money Money Money Money >> That was a clip from the film "We're Not Broke." Karin, I have to say, I love the music. It's very interesting, you almost think with the subject matter, how you feel about it, you'd go with ominous music. But it's just great. I found myself at one point, tapping my foot and bobbing my head as you're telling me how much lobbyists are spending on politicians. It was an interesting choice. Talk a little bit about the choice, going with that music. >> Well, from the clip that you just saw, that was the Young Holt Trio. They're from Chicago. That's "Ain't There Something That Money Can't Buy," and that was one of the films that we came across, and we were lucky enough to license it. Some other people we found, there's a woman whose music we used, her name's Colette Savard. We found her on Sound Cloud. We liked the song that she had done. We thought, oh, this could be fun and a little lively for a certain scene. So, Vicki approached her and said, could we license the song. She said, oh, well, that's a Tammy Wynette song, but how about I write something for you. She did, and then we were able to get some really original music in the film. Then, Chris Priest, who's one of the US Uncut activists from Boston is also a musician. So we used his song at the very end of the film in the credits, and another song by him in the film. So it was a great collaboration. Also, our composer, Dan Radlauer, who's out of Los Angeles, he really helped tie the whole musical feel together. >> Yeah, it's very upbeat. You stopped right at show tunes. It didn't go too crazy. No musical numbers. It was a nice balance, I thought. Let me ask you this. These CEOs of these multinationals that, you know, is it hard to get interviews with them? I mean, I would almost think that they would want to talk to you and say their side of it, because you don't have a lot of interviews in the film with like CEOs of these, like Exxon and GE. >> Right, well, one of the challenges is, in an 81-minute film, how much can you get in there. That's a challenge, because you always want to put more in than you can. Another thing was the first person we approached was the tax director for Google, and asked if we could interview them to talk about what we had read and other things. They declined. So, we found that, you know, that was one example of CEOs, not necessarily CEOs, but people in tax departments who really weren't going to talk to us, but we were able to find footage of a lot of these people speaking out about the issue themselves, so we thought, well, they've talked about it here. >> You sort of helped them defend themselves, in a way. >> Yeah, exactly, and they talk about exactly what they're doing, I want to bring the money back, I have $47 million, or whatever, overseas, and I want to bring that back. So that's something that we thought, well, they pretty much state their position right there. >> The other thing, US Uncut, they kind of pre-dated the Occupy movement. Talk a little bit about US Uncut, and where they're at. >> Yeah, US Uncut was something that we came across, actually through UK Uncut, which started in October, 2010, UK Uncut. They were protesting Vodafone in the United Kingdom, because they were comparing what Vodafone had not paid to the UK, equal to the amount of cuts that were being made to the public housing situation. So I read this article and I thought, oh, it'd be so great if there was something in the US like this, and we stumbled across US Uncut. Someone named Carl Gibson was the first person that we read about. He was in Jackson, Mississippi, at the time. Actually, I think he's living in Madison, Wisconsin, now. But he was in Jackson, Mississippi, and he said, you know, I'm just beginning this, I've never done any kind of activism, but I'm really fired up about it. As we met him, we started to meet many other people around the country who were going on to this US Uncut idea, and planning actions. I mean, there were actions in at least 50 cities, I think the very first time they did it. That was something that showed us that people did have an interest in this topic. When we started in October 2010, or September of 2010, in the US, nobody was talking about this issue at all. I mean, it was like you could hear a pin drop when we would bring up the subject. So we saw the US Uncut in February 2011, and we were excited, oh, there's a movement. Then come August 2011, US Uncut was sort dying out a bit, and we thought, oh no, you know. We were worried it was over, and soon after, a month later, Occupy Wall Street sprung up, and a lot of the US Uncut people ended up joining Occupy Wall Street. One of the people said, well, it gave us a 24-hour platform to talk about these issues. Now, I believe, you know, there are some movements, some US Uncut actions here and there, but really, UK Uncut is quite active still in the UK, and people, I think, are more aware about this topic in general. >> Well, let's see another clip from "We're Not Broke." >> Don't blame the companies. Companies have a fiduciary responsibility to their shareholders to legally maximizes the after tax rate of return. I think that's great. >> Multinational corporations always come back with the same argument. This stuff is legal. They're responding to the wishes of the shareholders, and they should do it as much as they can. But what's legal is not necessarily what's right. Apartheid in South Africa was legal in its day. Slavery was legal in its day. >> In a very strict legal sense you could argue that corporations are only responsible to the shareholders. But in the broader sense, they're stakeholders in America. They use our society. They use our labor force. They use our infrastructure. America allows them to earn all these profits. Don't they have to pay something back to the system? Isn't it really their civic duty, like any citizen, to pay their fair share of taxes? >> They're benefiting from all the same governmental services that we're paying for, the military, protection, the court system that they use all the time. And when they're not paying taxes, every person in this country has to pay more money to subsidize the multinational corporations. >> You know I've spent the last ten years giving hundreds of talks about taxes. Most people feel, I can't do anything. That's not a good thing to hear. This country got rid of slavery. Women got the right to vote. I have magazine clippings from more than a century ago where various ministers said the efforts of get child labor laws were the work of the devil. It's God's plan that these children should work in these factories. Well, we finally got child labor laws. We only make progress when people demand it. >> So, in your opinion, is what these companies are doing as bad as slavery, or not having child labor laws? >> Well, I don't want to make a comparison with those types of things, but this is an issue that is affecting everybody. We're all buying products from the corporations. The corporations are making record profits, yet they don't feel they should give anything back to the society. Our military is paying for their shipping lanes. They're driving on our roads. They're using our publicly educated people, yet they feel they don't need to contribute financially to those infrastructures of our society. So I think it's a huge issue. It's something that a lot of people, I did not make the connection before I made the film. I think a lot of people don't, because you go around and it's, you know, tax is sort of a hidden thing, and who's going to spend their time reading about corporate tax laws in their spare time. >> Great, well I know you have a website. >> Yeah, our website is www.werenotbrokemovie.com and you can find the film on DVD, and other things. Tell your friends if they miss the broadcast. >> Excellent. Well, thank you so much for being here with us today, Karin. Good luck with the film. >> Thanks so much. >> And hey, thank you all very much for joining us here at Director's Cut. For more information on "We're Not Broke," please go to our website, wpt.org and click on Director's Cut. I'm guest host Pete Schwaba, and that's a wrap. Pay your taxes! Pay your taxes! Do you pay your taxes? I do! Why doesn't this company? Bye.