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March Madness for Corporate Tax Dodgers
Top seeds in the Tax Haven Tourney: banks and power companies
The small companies and public didn't have a chance in the early rounds. Now it's down to a few formidable corporate teams, the Cheat 16:
- General Electric made $10.3 billion in 2009, but received a $1.1 billion tax rebate.
- Forbes said about Bank of America in 2010: "How did they not pay any taxes on $4.4 billion in income?"
- Oil giant Exxon made a $45 billion profit in 2009, but paid no taxes in the United States.
- Citigroup had 4 quarters of billion-dollar profits in 2010, but paid no taxes.
- Wells Fargo made $12 billion but purchased Wachovia Bank to claim a $19 billion tax credit.
- Hewlett Packard's U.S. income tax rate was 4.3% in 2008 and 2.3% in 2009.
- Verizon's 10.5% tax rate, according to Forbes, is due to its partnership with Vodafone, the primary target in UK Uncut's protests against tax evaders.
- Chevron's tax rate was 1% in 2008.
- Boeing, which just won a $30 billion contract to build 179 airborne tankers, got $124 million back from the taxpayers in 2010.
- Over the past 5 years Amazon made $3.5 billion and paid taxes at the rate of 4.3%.
- Carnival Cruise Lines paid 1% in taxes on its $11.5 billion profit over the past 5 years.
- Koch Industries is not publicly traded, so their antics are kept private. But they benefit from taxpayer subsidies in ranching and logging.
- In 2008 CorporateWatch said Rupert Murdoch's Newscorp paid "astoundingly low taxes" because of tax havens.
- Google "cut its taxes by $3.1 billion in the last three years by shifting its money around foreign countries.
- Merck, the second-largest drugmaker in the U.S., last year brought more than $9 billion from abroad without paying any U.S. tax.
- Pfizer, the largest drugmaker in the U.S., erased $10 billion in taxes with an "accounting treatment."
All the above has been documented by US Uncut Chicago members on PayUpNow.org .
Who's projected for the Final Frauding Four?
Best Defense: Google uses a game plan called a "Double Irish Defense," which moves most of its foreign profits through Ireland and the Netherlands to Bermuda.
Best Offense: GE's 2010 SEC 10-K tax filing boldly states: "At December 31, 2010, $94 billion of earnings have been indefinitely reinvested outside the United States...we do not intend to repatriate these earnings.."
Most Steals: Citigroup: 427 tax haven subsidiaries
Best Trash talk: A General Electric spokeswoman: “G.E. pays many other taxes including payroll taxes on the wages of our employees, property taxes, sales and use and value added taxes."
Most game-ending bailouts: Bank of America received $45 Billion in tax payer bailout funds in 2008 and 2009. In 2009 the company earned a pretax income of $4.4 billion, but claimed a $1.9 Billion tax benefit from the government.
Teams with the most reserves:
General Electric: $77 billion
Google: $24 billion
That's 2 companies holding $101 billion that could be invested in jobs.
Tax Haven Tourney Champion? GE is the Duke of Tax Avoidance.
Comments
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20 Comments so far
Show AllWe need a wealth tax, not income tax.
As long as corporations own the US Government it won't matter what you label the tax...wealth tax , smealth tax, income tax...you will pay it and corporations won't pay it. It IS as simple as that.
The income tax would work just fine if corporations paid as much as they did in 1970 when they paid 29% of US income tax. In 2009 they paid 6%.
Six months ago I would have told you that by 2020 corporations will pay zero % of US incomes tax, however, in December 2010 Obama told us he was pushing for "income tax simplification in the spirit of Reagan's 1986 tax reform".
1986 "tax reform" was the single largest tax shift in the history of US income tax, with corporations getting more tax breaks and taxes going up for the rest of us.
If Obama's income tax "simplification" succeeds, corproations will pay zero % of US income taxes before 2020 rolls around.
Logic for Looters, Lesson #1: Every tax is a wealth tax, just as every tax, in the relevant sense of the word, transfers wealth under duress.
By the way, thank Milton Friedman whenever employers withhold the wealth they promised to pay to their employees. In the case of withholding, the government taxes the employer's wealth more than would have been the case in the absence of the withholding scheme. Now, the employer doesn't want to eat this loss, too, so the employer cheats the employee by as much as he can. That's about half the amount extorted by the government, as I recall. (Of course, we're disregarding income taxes, sales taxes, and other taxes paid by the employer.)
No intelligent employee would tolerate being cheated by his employer, and if he has any guts he will sue the employer for breach of contract. His employer has a serious problem.
Solution? The government cut a deal with employers to shelter the employers from being sued by the employees for breach of contract. And since the government which is doing the taxing is basically the same group of people who control the courts, the deal with the employers is practical.
The federal government does not have the constitutional power to impose a wealth tax (the sixteenth amendment authorizes a tax on income, which is interpreted to include a tax on gifts and inheritances, but not on property or wealth per se). The states have the power to do so and they tax real estate and, in some cases, automobiles, airplanes and boats.
(1) So government should have more power to regulate the businesses which write the regulations?
(2) So the management of businesses should be merged more thoroughly with government?
(3) Is Fascism the merger of the corporation and the state? Do Progressives desire Fascism while pretending to oppose it?
(4) Are we climbing the yes ladder yet?
(5) Are the Republicans STILL struggling to get the IRS to monitor, or even to audit, how abortions are paid for? Yes they AA-ARE!
"IRS to conduct abortion audits?"
http://www.ifeminists.com/e107_plugins/enews/enews.php
(6) Are the Democrats and the Republicans a bipartisan coalition of Fascistic parties who want government to manage every private affair? Is the warfare state wedded to the welfare state? Are both parties friendly to the crony capitalism state?
(7) Are we still on the yes ladder? Are we headed toward revolt?
YES, WE AAA-ARE!!!
No matter how much tax is paid on the first million, more should ALWAYS be paid on the next million.
No special breaks for the big guys.
Bigness is badness.
Bigness IS badness and one the Democrats' and Republicans' primary missions is to enable big corporations to keep growing.
Too-big-to-fail is becoming the rule, not the exception now that other industries saw how well too-big-to-fail banksters profitted and continue to profit from taxpayer funded bailouts.
Because of the "Citizens United" court case, corporations are defined as people for political purposes.
Sense that is the law of the land, they must pay taxes as ordinary income, just like real people do.
Unless some law was passed after the Citizens United case giving tax breaks to corporations, they are people for tax purposes, too.
Almost all the U S Senators and half of the U S House of Representatives are millionaires. Why has the people elected millionaires to represent them, but expect that they will pass laws to help the middle class?
American are stupid, lazy, and greedy, and delusional.
rat4,
Don't forget to thank government for proclaiming the existence of corporations. Of course, every informed person knows that corporations don't exist at all but in the imaginations of businesspeople, lawyers, bureaucrats, and nattering, inattentive nabobs.
Aggregates of persons or physical things are mental objects. They are sets. This fact doesn't change because government says otherwise or applies the term "corporation" to an aggregate. The members of the set may be physical, but the set is never so.
CU was just an elaboration upon a theme to which governmentlovers like Buchheit have turn a blind eye when it suits their purposes to do so. (Note his suggestion that somebody be looted so that workers won't suffer. He wants workers to have a bigger cut of the criminalism.) And what theme am I referring to? It's Fascism, the merger of government and the management of business, among other thngs. Sure enough, that's exactly what Buchheit called for. More government management paying off poor, poor workers.
Yes, I'm calling Buchheit a Fascist.
Also, last I checked, the partners of GPs in Louisiana enjoy limited liability protection from govenment. For that problem, too, you need to blame......government.
If "American are stupid, lazy, and greedy, and delusional", as you claim, then it must be true that Americans who are leftists, Progressives, etc. are "stupid, lazy, greedy, and delusional".
Since government controls education and the schooling of nearly everyone, we can blame government for their stupidity, too. In fact, even private schools follow the government's foolish model of education.
Since it's leftists and Progressives who clamour most for government control over education, it follows that leftists and Progressives are responsible for the stupidity and the delusions, too.
Say, without government, who would there be to proclaim the existience of the limited liability corporation?
Does Buchheit like limited liability corporatism provided that its antics suit his tastes and preferences?
Say, is Buchheit a fan of keeping limited liability corporatism on the pretext that good can be drawn out of that outlandishly childish fraud?
Is there not a hair's width between Buchheit and any go-getting, oily lawyer on LaSalle Street who uses government to dig into other people's bank accounts? Is there not a hair's width between Buchheit and a Republican shill for crony capitalism?
Say, is Buchheit just an old-fashioned looter with nothing but populist tripe to offer the reader? If we got rid of the big bad corporations, who would be so easy a target for looters and moochers like Buchheit to find?
Do I state the obvious or just ask leading questions?
Was Hank Rearden, too, a crony capitalist who liked to play the game until crony capitalism's costs started to exceed the benefits to Hank Rearden? But I digress.
Buchheit, it's time to face the music. You're a dirty, rotten shill for crony capitalism. The difference between you and rightwing crony capitalists is from where on the income statement you'd drain the revenues.
Your crony capitalism drains revenue by increasing operating expenses and tax expenses. Rightwing crony capitalists, however, prefer to obtain the benefits of crony capitalism from the bottom line. But both of you are united in and by crony capitalism.
Huh??!!
"Say, without government, who would there be to proclaim the existience of the limited liability corporation?"
Your response: "Huh??!!"
Translation (with whiny a tone in your voice): "I don't get it!! Uhhhh."
So predictable. Go read what the abusive namecaller, rat4, wrote about stupid, delusional Americans. (Hint: I dont tink rat4 had u in mind.)
Your ravings make absolutely no sense. With psychiatric counseling and appropriate medications you will feel less anxious. Get help soon.
This article's astounding and appalling evidence notwithstanding, the fascist wings of the Republican and Democratic parties continue the Big Lie that AmeriKKKan corporations have the highest tax rates in the world.
AmeriKKKa is approaching third-world status in health care, education and overall quality of life, but the greedy-rich two percent continue their lavish and indulgent lifestyles. The AmeriKKKan government is non-functioning and it must be replaced with one that is of the people, by the people and for the people.
General strikes, boycotts, non-violent direct action. NOW!
Americans' government-sponsored and government-manged health care system is Fascistic healthcare. It is but one example of the merger of government with the management of private affairs.
"General strikes, boycotts, non-violent direct action. NOW!"
Translation: "Intimidate politicans to give more people a bigger cut of the organized crime class' wealth. Get the politicians to command the bureaucrats and cops to use violent means to bring about social change. Nevertheless, I, Tom Joad, am opposed to social change through violence. NOW!!"
But, Tom, if you loot the organized crime class, then then "greedy-rich two percent" aren't likely to have have much left to loot. Do ya follow? So you'll need to preserve the criminalism through which they got wealthy. Of course, I do not at all suggest that the organized crime class is just two percent of the population. If the "greedy-rich two percent" can't be looted enough to suit your tastes, you'll need to increase the tax rate applicable to the wealth of other members of the organized crime class.
So your tax rates, too, will be going up. This means that you'll have to reduce your charitable giving, right? After all, you're already donating every spare penny of your wealth. Right?
Finally, the "AmeriKKKan government" is functioning more or less as it always has, esp. since the Progressive era began. Your warfare-welfare-cronycapitalism state is as healthy as ever, and for this, too, we can thank Progressives who just don't wanna larn truth.
Sorry, Paul, I'm not hearing you.
Did you forget to identify the cause of this economic offense?
Paul, You're making my head spin with too much data on economic offenses, tax inequalities, derivative dangers, fraud frequencies, corporate looting complexities, torture secrecy, spying, anti-union attacks, etc., etc., etc., --- Ad nauseum.
Why not focus on the source of all these awful things --- The seminal causal cancer of the hidden EMPIRE at the heart of all these 'symptom issue' distractions!
Will protests have any effect on EMPIRE? if you don't say that EMPIRE is the cause of the problem? Of all problems?
If complaining about blocked corrective actions and protesting about unfairness by the supposed intellectuals behind the protest movements do not soon realize that they need to clearly identify the focus of their protest singularly at the "EMPIRE", which is the cancerous cause of everything from the divided 'symptom issue' protests against wars, economic oppression, spying ... and all the way down to saving the friggin whales, then they will soon enough find that Empire does not respond to anything that does not have the guts or brains to name its target as EMPIRE.
You can't attack Empire if you don't have the basic sense to identify it as 'Empire'.
Just some advice from an old strategic marketing guy who knows that you can't sell cars if you haven't educated (and told) people what a 'car' is.
And you can't sell a revolution "Against Empire" (Parenti) if the multitude don't know what an Empire they live in!
Alan MacDonald
Sanford, Maine
Liberty over violent empire -- People's Party 2012
George Carlin on businessmen:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SibF7GIOiSU
Hmmm
The "profit" numbers given above are horribly missleading. The fact of the matter is that the profit numbers in the article are pretax profits. That is profits after all the corporate "deductions" have been applied. Without them those numbers would on average more than triple. Remember Congress is about to eliminate whats left of the middle income tax deductions like home mortgages. If we just eliminated the corporate deductions and penalized them for sending money offshore, and stop giving them a trillion dollars a quarter would would not only have NO deficit, we would have a budget surplus. No wonder the NWO doesn't want the working class kids to learn math anymore.
Why blame these Companies and call them Cheats?
They are not cheats. They are "Avoiding" Taxes, which happens to be
our duty. If they were cheating and "Evading" Taxes--then they could be
properly punished. The Real Point is-- The System was set up by the Rich,
for the Rich and it's working just fine for the Rich. The Rich are very happy
with the Tax Laws--they wrote 'em!!!! For Their Benefit--not yours!
Go back to sleep---after you pay your Taxes!!