GE/BoA getting more bailouts on tax day now!

I just saw this on CNN, and it made my blood literally boil!

After deductions and adjustments - GE reported a negative 10.5 percent federal income tax rate... and wound up with a "tax benefit" of almost $1 billion.

...

As for Bank of America - after major losses in 2009... it ended the year with a tax benefit of almost $2 billion.

Source: caffertyfile.blogs.cnn.com...

GE made no profit in the US last year, so I can maybe.... maybe... understand the idea of not paying an income tax. But to get a tax benefit, as in moneys paid to them by the US government, of a billion dollars? Folks, this is not a person trying to eek out a living on substandard pay and getting a bit of a break! This is a corporation that made profit, a lot of profit, from operating overseas, and the government is giving them a billion dollars to boot! And then BoA gets 2 billion? BoA helped cause the mess we are in now, and already got bailout money!

It doesn't matter if you are a liberal, conservative, Democrat, or Republican... something has to be done about this... and soon. Otherwise we won't have a country to fight over.

TheRedneck

absolutely flabbergasted

can't say we didn't expect it though
with everybody else zeroing out.

This is just Corporate Welfare !!!!

There are more corporations on this list of paying no Federal Tax!

Companies that claimed they didn't make a profit in the US, yet (I think it was GE) pulled in 10 Billion in profit overseas.

It is unbelievable isn't it!

I am generally of the impression that we have quite enough laws, and as a rule I oppose any new law... but reading something like this makes me want to add one to my short list of new laws we actually do need:

"No corporate entity shall be paid a refund on taxation that exceeds the amount paid in during that taxation period."

In simple terms, if a business has a loss in the US, fine, no tax because no income. But they also cannot receive credits for more than they paid in during the year. That one addition to the tax code would stop corporate welfare dead in its tracks.

Of course, who wants to bet me that will never be written on official letterhead?

TheRedneck

reply to post by PRS395


If I were working for the IRS, I would look to see if I could re-adjust GE's tax returns using section 482. Section 482 of the Internal Revenue code allows the IRS to reallocate gains and losses between a US corporation and its foreign subsidiaries.

Companies like GE will report their domestic parent company suffered large losses while their foreign subsidiaries (where the tax rate is lower) made all the gains. Section 482 allows the government to re-write the return so more gains are experienced by the domestic parent company and more losses are shifted to the foreign subsidiaries.