One Cause For Our Anger; Corporate Welfare

Salon.com

In 2010, Verizon reported an annual profit of nearly $12 billion. The statutory federal corporate income tax rate is 35 percent, so theoretically, Verizon should have owed the IRS around $4.2 billlion. Instead, according to figures compiled by the Center for Tax Justice, the company actually boasted a negative tax liability of $703 million. Verizon ended up making even more money after it calculated its taxes.

The “high taxation” lie

Reading through this report, you will find yourself seized by an irresistible desire to hurl yourself headlong into the nearest OccupyYourLocalCity protest. In an era of crushing government deficits and mass unemployment, corporate America is not only skating blissfully free of its civic responsibilities, but continues to complain that it is paying too much in taxes. Even worse: Congressional Republicans and many Democrats agree! Listening to our politicians talk, you would imagine that corporate America’s neck is permanently under the tax man’s steel-tipped boot. When, in fact, the exact opposite is the truth.

This is just the beginning.

According to a report from Citizens For Tax Justice, titled, Corporate Taxpayers & Corporate Tax Dodgers 2008-2010, one of the corporations in it's list of 280 was taxed at an average -6.7% rate over a 3 year period. Wouldn't you love a multi-million dollar tax rebate?


Press Realease With Key Findings

“These 280 corporations received a total of nearly $223 billion in tax subsidies,” said Robert McIntyre, Director at Citizens for Tax Justice and the report’s lead author. “This is wasted money that could have gone to protect Medicare, create jobs and cut the deficit.”

I can't really say it any better than the report or the article did, all I can do is add in my own disgust. I personally will be taking careful note at which companies paid zero or less than zero (got a rebate) in taxes and boycott them. Currently I am under contract with AT&T Wireless but as soon as possible I will be going elsewhere.

I'm absolutely tired of poor people being labeled as a drag on society when we have this non-sense going on. Occupy Everywhere.

Corporate welfare at it's best.

Second.

I can support the boycott, it makes sense. i still don't support OWS, They aren't protesting the government which, if ran how it should be ran, wouldn't allow companies to behave like this in the first place.

S&F

Not only do governments have a spending problem, so do corporations.

Why do corporations have to hire 3 people to do a 1 person job? Oh yeah, gotta create jobs. Creating jobs is good, but not this way.
I think corporations should pay a little bit more in taxes because they also put a drain on local resources that need to be replaced. If the corporation is going to use local resources to make their billions, then it is only fair they pay a higher rate to replace those resources. Take take take, never any give.

If corporations would check their spending habits and streamline their operations and get rid of that BS theory that bigger is better, then things would change for the better.

reply to post by GringoViejo


I agree about the government at least in addition to protesting banks and corporations, but it's like a 3 headed hydra, the time to protest the government will come.

So why do the Democrats want to raise my taxes when GE and Verizon are barely paying anything? Like the extra 10k they can squeeze from me will help the federal budget. A billion or so from Verizon sounds like a better plan.

reply to post by GringoViejo


It is the ability of corporations and big-money interests to lobby our elected representatives that is the key issue here. They can pour tons of money into the Congress so that they will pass legislation in their favor.

Our representatives are surely part of the problem, but if you took the lobby money out of politics these crooks in office now never would have ran for office to begin with.

It all starts will the money....IE corporations and banks

I disagree that the problem starts with banks and corporations. www.abovetopsecret.com...

reply to post by Kali74


Excellent post! Theirs is the Pirates Code. Which is quite amusing in a film, but not so funny
in reality now is it. This is because this these taxes are ultimately paid by the public. This contributes further
to the federal borrowing in order to fill in the gap of tax income. Granted, I believe the Federal Government
needs to reign in its spending/borrowing as well. One way to do this, is to end this form of corporate welfare.

You Tube Link : 7 seconds long www.youtube.com...


S&F

S+F, great thread Kali!


I ran across a similar article today that showed some corporations even pay as "low" as -56% in taxes. As in negative 56%.

Come on let's be fair - some of this money made its way to Washington -

Congress got 25% richer during height of recession?

"Roll Call" reports that members of Congress had a collective net worth of more than $2 billion in 2010.

That was up about 25 percent from 2008, during the height of the recession. And these wealth totals likely underestimate how rich Congress really is.

That's because they don't include homes and other non-income generating property, which could come out to hundreds of millions in additional dollars

caffertyfile.blogs.cnn.com...

Is OWS just mad about rich people or are they mad because we have no jobs?

You can tax the rich five hundred kajllion quadrillion percent and it would not create jobs. You can give them a tax break of a million percent, and it will not create jobs.

Our jobs are being taken away from us by outsourcing to foreign countries. Nobody has anywhere to work, hence the reason we can't make any money. Start busting the asses of these corporations that send our jobs overseas, give them a tax penalty for every job they replace with a foreigner. Stop their tax breaks.

It's really not that hard.

the standard reply is that it will threaten a corporations ability to be competitive and they'll be forced to close down, lay off workers or move jobs overseas. which they do any way.

basically blackmail the government. which is what corporate lobby groups and politicians came up with while they were sipping brandy and smoking cigars, laughing hysterically at the face of the american people.

reply to post by GringoViejo


No they are protesting the owners of that government.

Or do you believe the millionaires secretly rule over the billionaires and call all of the shots?

Originally posted by Kali74
I'm absolutely tired of poor people being labeled as a drag on society when we have this non-sense going on. Occupy Everywhere.

Let's see.

Exactly why does Verizon need to be located in the US? What, precisely, are the jobs held by Americans at Verizon that can't be done by contract employees?

I wonder how much they would pay in US taxes if they located in, say, Germany?

Harte

Originally posted by GringoViejo
I can support the boycott, it makes sense.Textt which, if ran how it should be ran, wouldn't allow companies to behave like this in the first place.

S&F

Me too. These protesters need to think a little about who's responsible for making the laws that allow WS to operate the way they do. Although it's true there are a lot of crooks on WS, the enablers are all politicians.

In this case I think what is confusing the protesters is it's not just bad R lawmakers, but just as many, if not more D are guilty. They can't wrap their minds around that, so instead they go after someone else to blame.

reply to post by Kali74


i truly believe that we need to start boycotting all these companies who take advantage of the system. They cry poor but give themselves billions of dollars of our taxes as bonuses. the government does not want to help so it has to start with the people

reply to post by jjkenobi


I don't understand why you use the term democrats? Is it because we have a Democratic president? Then why not say say his name instead of the label "democrats"? We don't have a Democratic congress and senate is close to 50-50, so you can't be talking about them either. Maybe selective outrage isn't helping? Lets get real, it doesn't matter which party is in govenment, taxes will be raised regardless. Partisanship is a cancer in our society.

I personally would like to see all individual income taxes abolished. Taxing the sweat of a mans hard work is immoral in my opinion.

And then change the remaining tax code to a flat 10% corporate tax on profits only, not assets. And no deductions or loopholes for anyone.

Simplified and everyone knows upfront, about how much they'll have to pay.

And the GOV will know how much they have to spend.

Any social programs that the GOV isn't funding under this idea are handled by people spending their money on the things they value.

Originally posted by groundplant
I personally would like to see all individual income taxes abolished. Taxing the sweat of a mans hard work is immoral in my opinion.

And then change the remaining tax code to a flat 10% corporate tax on profits only, not assets. And no deductions or loopholes for anyone.

Simplified and everyone knows upfront, about how much they'll have to pay.

And the GOV will know how much they have to spend.

Any social programs that the GOV isn't funding under this idea are handled by people spending their money on the things they value.

That would bankrupt the government over night, at least how the government is run now. Massive changes would need to made on liabilities, defense, education, energy infrastructure, environmental control and preservation, medical, scientific and technological research, intelligence, border control and customs...the list goes on and on. What do you think helps pay for that?