Billionaire investor Carl Icahn has made a scary video just before Halloween to rival anything Adam Sandler is doing with Hotel Transylvania 2. Icahn has seen markets rise and fall for decades and, in “Danger Ahead“, he warns that what’s next is “very dangerous and could be disastrous.” Doubling down on his scary Halloween theme, Icahn begins by talking about Donald Trump — who is sure to be a popular costume this year. Trump’s popularity can ultimately only mean one thing, Icahn says, that corporate profits aren’t reaching a frustrated disenfranchised public. But since Icahn agrees, he’s backing Trump, who he thinks can face down the special interests — like Teddy Roosevelt did! (That’s Icahn’s analogy: Trump/Roosevelt.) Then he goes on to paraphrase Kurtz in Heart of Darkness
The first horror is that carried-interest tax loophole that allows investment operations to pay reduced rates. (Trump has targeted this too.) The second horror is the way US tax policy keeps multinationals from making America home. Corporate tax reform is a must or doomsday, says Icahn. If reform were in place, corporations could stop creating the illusion of sustainable profitability, says Icahn, and actually invest in making profitability sustainable.
