A pledge to work to strengthen the World Trade Organization (WTO) – not destroy it – was made by U.S. Trade Representative (USTR) Robert Lighthizer last week.The U.S. “recognizes the importance of international trading systems” and is committed to “working with other members to improve the functioning of the WTO," trade body, the Office of the USTR said in a statement issued June 8.Trade “has not always worked to the benefit of everyone” and certain “unfair trade practices” have harmed U.S. interests and created “large, persistent trade imbalances," the statement said, and was released during a WTO mini-ministerial meeting in Paris. It marked a shift in tone from President Donald Trump's campaign description of the WTO as a “disaster” and his threat to withdraw from the organization entirely.Meanwhile, in his first WTO address as USTR, Lighthizer told his colleagues at the Paris meeting the WTO was so essential that if it had not already been invented it would need to be. Even so, he said WTO is not working efficiently and it must be modernized to prevent unfair trade practices.Reaction to Lighthizer's remarks was positive. Lighthizer “was quite clear,” Mexican Economy Minister Ildefonso Guajardo said. “They're interested in a well-functioning and efficient multilateral institution, and obviously it is going to require debate.”Senate Bill Would Provide Tax Relief for Bankrupt Farmers
Tax relief for family farmers in bankruptcy is the subject of bipartisan legislation introduced in the Senate, a proposal described as a “game changer” for those kinds of cases.The Family Farmer Bankruptcy Clarification Act of 2017 (S. 1237) aims to “correct” a 2012 Supreme Court ruling on Chapter 12, said Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, introduced the measure in the Senate May 25 with Sen. Al Franken, D-Minn.Chapter 12 of the Bankruptcy Code is designed to protect family farmers and family fishermen with a regular income. The debtors are afforded protection from creditors while they make payments under a plan to repay all or a portion of their debts over a three- to five-year period.Specifically, the proposed bill would help farmers sell a portion of their land to help fund their reorganization and stay in business despite being levied with a large capital gains bill. The act would change how those capital gains taxes are treated. Instead of being a priority claim that would have to be satisfied in full before unsecured creditors receive payments, the capital gains would be treated as another general unsecured claim.The measure would vastly alter the landscape of small farm bankruptcy cases, according to lawyers. “In many cases, those capital gains taxes would force the debtors to quit farming altogether,” Carol Dunbar told Bloomberg BNA in a June 5 email about the law in its current state. Dunbar has been a Chapter 12 trustee in Iowa since the chapter's inception in 1986.While heartening to farmers, the bill's prospects are unclear as standalone legislation. Similar bills introduced in the Senate over the past few years have died in committee. Still, the Senate Judiciary Committee plans hearings -- Grassley is the panel chairman.
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