It’s like they’re living the American dream
By Drilling Firm Seeks Favor as Expatriate
The language in the House measure seems innocuous enough. Tucked into the Coast Guard budget bill, it says merely that Section 608 ( c ) (1) “is amended by striking the second sentence.”
But what that language would do is allow one company, Nabors Industries, to gain permanent access to business open only to American companies. The language is needed because Nabors, a big oil drilling company, moved its tax headquarters to Bermuda and its legal headquarters to Barbados in 2001 to avoid American taxes.
Competitors argue that they will be slowly strangled if Nabors is allowed to vie for contracts while paying little in taxes. Nabors is a well-run company, said Ken Wells, president of the Offshore Marine Service Association, and its tax advantages allow it to underbid other offshore supply companies. The association, therefore, opposes the provision as a favor to one of its 101 members at the expense of the others, Mr. Wells said.
Two years ago, after extensive negotiations with its competitors, Nabors won from Congress what amounted to a temporary exemption that ends in August 2007. So now the company’s chief executive, Eugene M. Isenberg, is asking Congress to make the exemption permanent.
My favorite part is where we find out why the law, as it currently stands, ordinarily forbids offshore companies from winning contracts:
Deleting that one sentence from the Coast Guard budget law amounts to giving Nabors Industries a permanent waiver from the Jones Act, a law enacted in 1920 that was intended to protect national security. The Jones Act requires that all ships moving people and cargo between domestic ports be American-owned, American-built and sailed by American crews.
When the Lord closes a door, some way he opens a window.