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Pay Your Fair Share: Protesters Rally At Hedge Fund Meeting In Greenwich

GREENWICH, Conn. — A caravan of tax justice demonstrators lined up Thursday evening outside the Indian Harbor Yacht Club in Greenwich to protest efforts by hedge fund leaders to protect tax loopholes.

Demonstrators rally Thursday against hedge fund greed across from the Indian Harbor Yacht Club in Greenwich.

Demonstrators rally Thursday against hedge fund greed across from the Indian Harbor Yacht Club in Greenwich.

Photo Credit: Contributed

The crowd rallied from AQR Capital Management to the gates of the Connecticut Hedge Fund Association’s quarterly gathering at the yacht club to deliver their message. Activists chanted phrases, including “pay your fair share” and “tax the rich,” accompanied by large inflatables and an array of signs blasting the state's tax structure.

The Connecticut Hedge Fund Association, which was meeting there, is lobbying against closing the Carried Interest Tax Loophole. 

Demonstrators also rallied outside AQR Capital Management, which received a $35 million break from the state last year.

Local residents, workers, community leaders, clergy, and activists traveled from Bridgeport to Greenwich for the protest. There, they demanded that the Connecticut General Assembly "stop shifting the burden on the backs of working families and make the wealthy and large corporations carry their weight and pay their fair share," the group said in a statement.

After the protest, demonstrators sent a petition to the General Assembly featuring four revenue proposals. 

Over the past week, the petition was signed by hundreds of Connecticut residents. The signers said they are tired of continued talks of service cuts, layoffs, concessions, and regressive taxes "while a privileged few continue to exploit the state without accountability."

The proposals for closing the $3.5 billion state budget deficit include closing the Carried Interest Tax Loophole (over $520 million per year); raising the income tax on millionaires, who pay half the effective tax rate of the middle class (over $217.3 million for every half a percentage point); cutting corporate tax credits (which added up to $707 million in 2017 alone); and implementing the Low Wage Employer Fee on large corporations ($305 million annually).

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