Tax Changes for Overseas Firms

American President Barack Obama proposed changing provisions in the tax code that he says encourage U.S. companies to move jobs overseas, as part of a broader package aimed at saving $210 billion over 10 years.

Obama will seek to follow through on a campaign promise to change the tax treatment of American firms with overseas operations. That portion of his plan — opposed by such firms as Pfizer Inc and Oracle Corp — would raise more than $100 billion in revenue over the next decade.

In an echo of a line he used often on the campaign trail last year, Obama vowed in a February address to the U.S. Congress to make the tax code more fair by “finally ending the tax breaks for corporations that ship our jobs overseas.”

Currently, U.S. firms are allowed to defer paying taxes on profits earned overseas if they plow those profits back into their foreign subsidiaries. An array of firms signed onto a letter to congressional leaders in March opposing changes to the so-called deferral provision, saying they would make U.S. businesses less competitive.