Imagine that you and I are rowing in a boat together. The wind is against us, the sea is not calm, and we're really straining.

We are part of a crew of eight, let's say. We're working hard. We've got a long way to go.

Then you and I look around — and notice that one of us isn't rowing.

He's kicked back with his feet up, he has a beer in one hand and a cigar in the other, just lying there with a smug smile on his face as the other seven of us sweat and do all the work.

We'd be furious. We'd give him one second to get to work like the rest of us or we'd throw him overboard.

This metaphor is about taxes and the load we all carry to allow our country to function. And the guy who's not rowing is the big corporation with special tax breaks.

We have a dirty federal tax system for corporations. The only word that fits it is “corrupt,” although a lot of what goes on is technically legal — and that's part of the problem. Consider these facts:

• Corporate taxes in the United States equate to about 1.3 percent of gross domestic product. Most industrialized countries collect amounts equivalent to about 2.5 percent of GDP. We could double our collections from big corporations without hurting competitiveness.

n U.S. corporations can avoid taxes on foreign earnings if they keep them overseas. So what do they do? They keep as much as possible overseas — which means they get invested in jobs and productive capacity there, not here.

• Corporations hire platoons of lobbyists (read: expensive wheeler-dealer rule-changers) in Washington to arrange tax code provisions hand-tailored to reduce taxes specifically for them.

I'm not going to name names, because we've either got to end this organized cheating for everyone all together, or we're not going to be able to end it at all. Not every company enjoys this sleazy race to pay less. And let's remember that when the corporations pay less, the pressure is on you and me to pay more, to make up the loss.

One business leader spoke for many, I believe, when he said the present tax regime encourages competition “based not on product quality and services, but on accounting gymnastics.”

One hopeful sign is that the public has gotten a whiff of this widespread con game, which may bring closer the day when lawmakers summon the courage to end all the special tax breaks. In a recent New York Times/CBS News poll, nearly two-thirds of those who answered said they thought American corporations paid less than their “fair share” of taxes.

You'd think it would be easy to clean this up. But because of last year's Citizens United decision from the Supreme Court, business can now contribute unlimited amounts to many political causes, which means a corporation can literally, and legally, bribe a member of Congress to sponsor those technical, obscure, midnight insertions of small-print into the tax code that give them a free ride.

You can tell I'm burned up about this. Turn around and look again at the back of the boat we're rowing — there's that fat guy, lolling, not working, drinking his beer and puffing on his cigar. And you know what? Just a short while ago, slobs just like the one in the back of our boat got themselves into so much financial trouble that you and I had to bail them out.

I've just about had it with this guy. What about you? Let's tell our representatives in Congress we want all tax code changes out in the open, with a price tag, for 30 days before action. Plus a statement by the Congressional Budget Office as to who they will help or hurt. In the present political climate, which supports holding lawmakers accountable for what they do, something like this might actually fly.

Peter Goldmark, a former publisher of the International Herald Tribune, headed the climate program at the Environmental Defense Fund. He wrote this for Newsday on Long Island, N.Y.