Huge Corporate Profits- so Why do They Need a Tax Cut?

a reply to: Blaine91555

Impeaching a party? How about sending a bunch of them to trial for crimes against humanity and crimes against earth?

Small companies are clearly at a disadvantage as it is, lower taxes would help them and give them a chance to fend off the sharks. Small companies are the one's who's owners are putting in so many hours that in the end, they would probably be better off working full time at McDs. I would tend to agree with you, having a 10% flat tax would likely benefit everyone in the end.

One idea I have tinkered with in my mind, would be 0% tax up to a certain profit and then begin applying exponentially higher tax brackets. Or better yet, a profit to revenue ratio, taxing companies on a Profit to Revenue ratio would force them to decrease consumer prices, or increase cost of labor, or find a different loophole in order to reach those near 0% taxes.

My question OP, is why do they need to be taxed at all? I have no problems with "the rich, getting richer". "They" tend to buy more stuff, creating more "jobs". Which in turn, creates "richness", which creates more "jobs",...which creates...etc.!!. Nobody, rich or poor. Should be, "taxed" for just existing. I'd be more focused on the "government/States, to actually know how to "budget". That seems more "educated/logical", to me. It must be nice to, "by law", to increase your "income" and not "earning"... What a charmed world they live in.... It's like they have "democrats", among them...

a reply to: Phage

The code need not be written in such a way that things like that can happen. The problem is the incentives politicians have to keep it the way it is.

Is it possible? Likely not as long as politicians are stuck in a trap they are not willing to legislate themselves out of. To survive they must engage in paybacks and they are stuck in an endless loop of finding ways to do that. In return we get tax codes so complex most can't even begin to figure it out and those who do are more than happy to take advantage of the gift they are given.

We lose the ability for the average person or family to start a business and succeed while competing against huge companies who have a built in advantage, we as a country lose an important part of our identity.

a reply to: UndeadWarrior

Still though, that's the sort of thing that got us to this point. In my mind a single rate that applies to all equally is the way to go.

Now for income taxes, I'm fine with a progressive rate, but there needs to be a cap on it that only a nationwide referendum could change.

originally posted by: Blaine91555
a reply to: Phage

I'm the wrong person to try and drag into a Right Left nonsense debate. I hate both Parties equally. If you want my view on that they should all be impeached and replaced both Dem's and Republicans.

My opinion is based on how I see it and have seen it for a long time now. I believe with a simple 10% tax on profits across the board we would see more revenue and everyone would be playing on a level field.

Small companies can't advantage the loopholes the large ones can and it puts them at an extreme disadvantage.

Most loopholes come from making contracts with the state. A company will open a division in Ohio for example in exchange for a tax break. Often times these tax breaks can't legally be given as they're favored to one specific company, so they'll write a loophole that only that one company can take advantage of.

The problem is, this is precisely what Senators are supposed to be doing for their state. They're supposed to be making favorable contracts and driving money/jobs to their area. States are in competition with each other for these resources.

If everything is a flat rate and we remove the loopholes, then how is West Virginia supposed to attract investment to one day retrain coal workers?

a reply to: Blaine91555

What would your thoughts be on abolishing profits, thus eliminating the need for taxes? Kind of off derailing this a bit, but I like your thought process and would like to pick your brain on this.

A truly balanced economy should always balance to a "0" in the end should it not? You made a dollar because you worked a day, I made a dollar because I worked one day. Those who paid you and I that dollar, made that dollar off of us somehow due to company XYZ. In the end, I will give my dollar back to XYZ, and it should theoretically in turn return that dollar to me in the end.

a reply to: Blaine91555

We lose the ability for the average person or family to start a business and succeed while competing against huge companies who have a built in advantage, we as a country lose an important part of our identity.

Do you think it's taxes that prevent someone from competing with Apple? The glory of entrepreneurship is in the finding, or creation of a market that did not exist. Partnerships and sole proprietorships are the where such things begin, not the corporate world. Those are personal taxes, not corporate taxes.

I think that entrepreneurs are limited more by local regulation (in some localities) than anything else.

originally posted by: Blaine91555
We lose the ability for the average person or family to start a business and succeed while competing against huge companies who have a built in advantage, we as a country lose an important part of our identity.

That's the nature of competition though. If you can take advantage of an economy of scale, you're going to have a lower cost per unit, and therefore a lower price point. The only way we can ever eliminate that is if we do away with big business. We've made corporations immortal though by passing wealth and assets on to children, when they were supposed to die out with their owners... forcing businesses to remain smaller on average.

a reply to: Aazadan

That doesn't sound like healthy competition to me...it kind of sounds more like why some skills in today's society have become worthless. Someone will always do it for cheaper(in this case it's via tax breaks), and in the end the ones that lose are the wage earners because their wages will be decreased to reflect that a state or country will do it for cheaper.

a reply to: UndeadWarrior

it kind of sounds more like why some skills in today's society have become worthless.

Yup. Not much call for makers of buggy whips. As they say.

a reply to: UndeadWarrior

Doing more for less is part of competition. Also remember, competition doesn't exist to make winners. It exists to make losers. Only one participant in a competition wins, everyone else loses.

If you want to change that, then you're looking to change our entire economic system to one not based on competition. And that's much bigger in scope than a mere shift in taxes.

a reply to: Aazadan

Yes, I realize that. I am referring to a system that is based on CONTRIBUTION, not competition. So long as we debate tax rates, nothing will change and the entire point is that everyone is a loser except that "one" participant(1%) that you have referred to. As such, we(the 99%) are all losers. Change will only come one we as people realize that no one person's contribution is more valuable than another...but that's a whole other debate that I should take to a new topic.

a reply to: UndeadWarrior

Rating contributions is just another form of competition. One person harvests 10 pounds of grain, another harvests 11. One person will want more for their efforts.

Quota systems can work, but then we end up like the Soviets and no one ever produces above the quota. Overproduction has given us all a pretty nice lifestyle.

Or are you referring to time? I would argue that not all time is equal, and the concept of wages seems to agree with me. One person can run a combine and harvest 100 pounds of grain in an hour. Another may not know how to drive and can only harvest 1 pound by hand. Is their time equal?

originally posted by: tadaman
a reply to: CB328

The solution is a total reset.

No safety nets. Nothing preserved.

Start from zero. Burn it all

Erase all traces of our legacy. Ask the new ones to be simple and kind. That is all.

We are wicked.

Either something takes our place or we limit ourselves.

This wont happen so we need to be destroyed.

Every time....

I'm glad you're not in charge! You want to dump thousands of years of human evolution? You may not like the way things are but leave it to the rest of us to keep the process going. Who knows, in 3000 years from now, we may finally achieve utopia.

it's very simple

A. taxes do not solve problems
B. if you can do business cheaper elsewhere why wouldn't you??

easssyyyyyy

originally posted by: toysforadults
it's very simple

A. taxes do not solve problems
B. if you can do business cheaper elsewhere why wouldn't you??

easssyyyyyy

Taxes solve plenty of problems. Taxes created the moon landing, that brought about many innovations, some of which we're using right now to communicate.

Sometimes doing business cheaper isn't the primary motivation. If your business wants access to a particular market you might be bound by contract to keep jobs in a less profitable area. There's many more factors in play than corporate tax rates. There's also trade deals, cost of labor, and skill of labor. Then there's also the fact that moving can sometimes be a huge logistics nightmare, and your headquarters is merely a sunk cost. Out of the 50 states in the US, only one is the absolute best to set up your business. Yet all 50 states have corporations in them. Variations in tax rates don't drive companies away when there's still profit to be made.

originally posted by: Aazadan
a reply to: UndeadWarrior

Doing more for less is part of competition. Also remember, competition doesn't exist to make winners. It exists to make losers. Only one participant in a competition wins, everyone else loses.

If you want to change that, then you're looking to change our entire economic system to one not based on competition. And that's much bigger in scope than a mere shift in taxes.

You've got that all wrong. Our economic system is fantastic. Of course there's competition but it's not like a game where time runs out and you have one winner. In a capital society, the competition is what keeps companies improving their products/services. Those that don't do that will fail and someone else takes their place. Happens all the time. It takes a lot of work to be successful. That part, work, is what I think a lot of people have a problem with.

originally posted by: toysforadults
it's very simple

A. taxes do not solve problems
B. if you can do business cheaper elsewhere why wouldn't you??

easssyyyyyy

They're not doing business elsewhere - they're doing business everywhere! They're just putting the money elsewhere so they don't have to pay their share of taxes in the U.S. It isn't easy either. You have to spend a lot on lawyers to find the right loopholes and to have them write the right language to "appear" like you're not doing anything wrong when you get called out.

a reply to: LogicalGraphitti

If we keep the process going, give it another few decades and you will see thousands of years of "evolution" collapse. Money has proven to be DEVOLUTION. If you think profits, are what keeps the world going, how about asking people like Tesla who we're trying to do something good for humanity(NOT to make money), and likely got killed for it? Or the guy who managed to make a car that ran on water? Humanity will want to succeed, humanity wants to learn and improve. If history has taught us anything is that humanity is curious and wants to learn and challenge itself daily.

The thing that allows companies to beat out their competitors is to CHALLENGE their process, to chart it, analyze it, see it's faults and weaknesses, improve it, test it, implement it, recap, tweak etc. Large scale corporations call it Six Sigma, Kaizen or Leaning. Cut out the fat, cut out the risk, reduce the risks.

DMAIC = Define, Measure, Analyze, Improve and Control

This sometimes requires tearing down everything we have grown accustomed too.

a reply to: LogicalGraphitti

What company do you work for? I work for what is one of the largest corporations in north america in the field that is the root of most of societies problems. We are not offering better service, we are not offering better products. We are cutting costs, we are telling our employees they matter, we tell our customers they matter and that we want to serve them better, but in the end we are charging them more for less, by less happy employees. We are developing applications to "better" serve the customer, when in the end all it is doing is reducing our labor costs and company overhead while moving these expenses(time) to the end user/customer. We are closing offices with higher tenure and higher salaries and moving their jobs to cheaper locations to better serve YOU. YOU is the shareholder, because it is all about shareholder return in the end. Yes, they are forced to be "better" in the sense they must compete with their competitors...but...in the end...Deal with Company A or B, it is highly likely that the dividends of either which company will end up in the pockets of Financial firm A or Investor A, because Investor A or Firm A is invested in both parties, they can not lose.

One easy example I can give...I recently switch from Telephone provider Fido to Rogers because Fido was charging me too much...Guess what, Rogers owns Fido...and they are offering me a better "Service" that is a better price(Oh, and i had to spend 1 hour on the phone with them to get 60$ of ridiculous charges off my new account as a new customer).