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I believe Exxon Mobil, IBM and General Electric all had zero federal taxes for the last several years. In fact, most of these global giants have net gains in the billions from the Federal coffers. And all have made significant profits over the same period.Originally Posted by paul young
where do you come up with a ludicrous statement like that. as a former IBM stock holder that is totally false. I am fairly sure the other companies can all show they paid Federal taxes too...the ONLY part of your statement that may be true is that the global giants made billions...Here is IBM's 2008 annual report which was obtained with an elementary Google search
http://www.ibm.com/annualreport/2008/note_p.shtml
All my Exes live in Texas
DNF, I can't speak to what Goose intended to say, but I can comment on how I read his remarks.
I think that Social Security, in and of itself, is not a bad thing. Nor do I read Goose's comments to be saying that either. In fact, run correctly it's a very good thing. Exactly what it's name implies, Security.
The problem is that our Government has been running it like a Ponzi scheme. They take in money, spend it, and then pay out dividends with the money they take in later. Isn't that exactly what Bernie Madoff is in prison for?
If all the money paid into Social Security has been saved and used for Social Security, what condition would the program be in now?
Ron
www.portlandlabrador.com
A Lab has no appreciation for the artistic value of a bonsai tree, but does appreciate their potential as chew toys.
Good for you!BTW, to the comments about being a beneficiary of gov paid education etc, I paid every dollar of my college education out of my pocket. No gov loans, grants, no parents to pay. It was soley on me. My dad died while I was a child, my mom was a school teacher, no wealth accumulation there.
And my company won every contract based upon competitive bids.
Who paid for the first 12+ years the tooth fairy?
Your mother taught school (so did mine) who paid her?
I paid for my education also with no debt and I have 8 years beyond the BS degree.
The competive biding is not what I asked: did you have any govenment contracts and did the toothless fairy pay you?
This is what he was all about!:
Vinny last hunting year
53 pheasants in South Dakota 200 + ducks in Idaho
Lasting memories Vinny was 13+ years old!
Well, then talk to the republicans who opened it up to the general fund and want to privatize it after all these years! If it is a Ponzi scheme (which is a very loose application of that phrase, BTW) it has been a damn successful one! SS has a fund, and a long-term plan to ensure payout reserve. A true Ponzi scheme cares nothing of that.
I understand what you're saying, but don't agree that is what many young conservatives are saying also. JMO
God Bless PFC Jamie Harkness. The US Army's newest PFC, but still our neighbor's little girl!
You should pay attention more.
http://abcnews.go.com/Business/Tax/g...0300167&page=1
You can argue about whether this is good or bad. After all, look at the parts I bolded. What does that do to the argument that the bottom half pays no taxes? The way I see it, if corporations just pass their costs on to consumers, then the bottom 50% is paying part of those taxes too. And since they pretty much spend all of their income instead of saving around 35% of it like I do, if you could figure it out, they are paying a higher percentage than they are shown to pay in the analysis at the link that David provided. It isn't honest to say that corporations just pass their tax cost on to consumers out of one side of your mouth, then argue out of the other side that lower income people pay no taxes.
GE, Exxon Paid No U.S. Income Taxes in '09
As you work on your taxes this month, here's something to raise your hackles: Some of the world's biggest, most profitable corporations enjoy a far lower tax rate than you do--that is, if they pay taxes at all.
A view of the Exxon Mobil refinery in Baytown, Texas September 15, 2008. None of ExxonMobil's income taxes were paid to the U.S. last year.
(Jessica Rinaldi/Reuters)
The most egregious example is General Electric. Last year the conglomerate generated $10.3 billion in pretax income, but ended up owing nothing to Uncle Sam. In fact, it recorded a tax benefit of $1.1 billion.
Avoiding taxes is nothing new for General Electric. In 2008 its effective tax rate was 5.3%; in 2007 it was 15%. The marginal U.S. corporate rate is 35%.
In Pictures: What The 25 Top U.S. Companies Pay In Taxes
How did this happen? It's complicated. GE's tax return is the largest the IRS deals with each year--some 24,000 pages if printed out. Its annual report filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission weighs in at more than 700 pages.
Inside you'll find that GE in effect consists of two divisions: General Electric Capital and everything else. The everything else--maker of engines, power plants, TV shows and the like--would have paid a 22% tax rate if it was a standalone company.
It's GE Capital that keeps the overall tax bill so low. Over the last two years, GE Capital has displayed an uncanny ability to lose lots of money in the U.S. (posting a $6.5 billion loss in 2009), and make lots of money overseas (a $4.3 billion gain). Not only do the U.S. losses balance out the overseas gains, but GE can defer taxes on that overseas income indefinitely. The timing of big deductions for depreciation in GE Capital's equipment leasing business also provides a tax benefit, as will loan losses left over from the credit crunch.
But it's the tax benefit of overseas operations that is the biggest reason why multinationals end up with lower tax rates than the rest of us. It only makes sense that multinationals "put costs in high-tax countries and profits in low-tax countries," says Scott Hodge, president of the Tax Foundation. Those low-tax countries are almost anywhere but the U.S. "When you add in state taxes, the U.S. has the highest tax burden among industrialized countries," says Hodge. In contrast, China's rate is just 25%; Ireland's is 12.5%.
Corporations are getting smarter, not just about doing more business in low-tax countries, but in moving their more valuable assets there as well. That means setting up overseas subsidiaries, then transferring to them ownership of long-lived, often intangible but highly profitable assets, like patents and software.
As a result, figures tax economist Martin Sullivan, companies are keeping some $28 billion a year out of the clutches of the U.S. Treasury by engaging in so-called transfer pricing arrangements, where, say, Microsoft's overseas subsidiaries license software to its U.S. parent company in return for handsome royalties (that get taxed at those lower overseas rates).
"Corporations are paying lower amounts of their profits in taxes now than in the past," says Douglas Shackelford, who teaches tax law at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. "Other countries have been lowering their rates, but not the U.S."
Mind you, not all global megacorps enjoy such low tax rates. Try to muster some pity for Big Oil. ExxonMobil paid more income taxes than any other U.S. company last year, some $15 billion, or 47% of pretax earnings. Exxon's peers Chevron and ConocoPhillips likewise paid out more than half their earnings in income taxes. The oil companies are oddities among the multinationals because many of the oil-rich countries where they do business levy even higher taxes than the U.S.
Exxon tries to limit the tax pain with the help of 20 wholly owned subsidiaries domiciled in the Bahamas, Bermuda and the Cayman Islands that (legally) shelter the cash flow from operations in the likes of Angola, Azerbaijan and Abu Dhabi. No wonder that of $15 billion in income taxes last year, Exxon paid none of it to Uncle Sam, and has tens of billions in earnings permanently reinvested overseas.
Likewise, GE has $84 billion in overseas income parked indefinitely outside the U.S.
Naturally the Obama administration wants to put an end to this. It has proposed doing away with tax deferrals on overseas income. If the plan passes, a U.S. company that pays a 25% tax on profits in China would have to pay an additional 10% income tax to Uncle Sam to bring it up to the 35% corporate rate. "Eliminating deferrals would put U.S. companies on an unlevel playing field," says the Tax Foundation's Hodge, "especially if competing with the likes of Germany, which only taxes companies on domestic operations."
Hewlett-Packard and others among the top 25 state in their annual reports that if Obama's tax measures pass it would mean a certain tax hike, probably amounting to billions of dollars.
Would no more tax holiday for GE really end up helping Mr. and Mrs. Taxpayer? Doubtful. "The average Joe should be in favor of lower corporate taxes," says Hodge, "because ultimately they are paying the corporate income tax. Either as workers, getting lower wages and fewer jobs, or as consumers, paying higher prices, or as retirees, getting lower dividends and earnings on their investments."
In the same vein, JPMorgan Chase Chief Executive Jamie Dimon has spoken out against an Obama proposal to levy a special tax on banks to recoup bailout costs. "Using tax policy to punish people is a bad idea," said Dimon. "All businesses tend to pass costs on to customers."
Last edited by Buzz; 01-29-2011 at 08:30 AM.
"For everyone to whom much is given, of him shall much be required." -- Luke 12:48
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Yes, I do their federal income taxes. By the way people tend to say they pay federal income taxes because they have federal income taxes witheld from their paycheck however they actually end up with zero federal income tax liability.
The numbers I posted are the actual 2010 calculations using the standard deduction.
I didn't even go into a possible mortgage deduction, child care deductions etc.
I used the actual standard deduction numbers.
Hihope Hiland Heathen of Perth CD, RE, CGC, TDI
http://money.cnn.com/2010/04/16/news...0_tax_returns/
From Forbes Magazine
http://thinkprogress.org/2010/04/06/exxon-tax/
Found this information in about 3 minutes. Don't have time to continue the research for you. The question was asked, show me somoeone who doesn't owe the IRS, these are two examples.
My Mom & Dad proportionally paid more for my "public" education than lower income folks, i.e., my parents paid for my lower education & some for less financially fortunate over and above my share. Not the government, especially the fed gov, since there was no fed gov aid to local education in those days. You have to understand since the government adds nothing to the GNP, they cannot pay for anything. The only ability of the government, relative to revenue & finance, is to regulate & to redistribute wealth received from productive individuals & corporations. Obviously since I was in the defense electronics business, somewhere close to 50% of our contracts were at some level funded by the federal defense budget, although less than 5% directly government contracts. Over 50% of our contracts were funded by foreign companies. But we paid taxes on all the profits from the contracts whether US or foreign. The effect of which added tax revenue to the US IRS far exceeding just the US contracts. Nonetheless, I don't see how your questions and assertions are germain to a discussion on the rich and taxes. No, if there is a tooth fairy effect, it's to those who don't work, pay taxes or less than their share (meaning get back more than they contribute).
I've given you a 1st-hand summary picture that clearly shows that taxing individuals in the higher income brackets is a deterrent to jobs. That just taking a simpleton approach that all with income over $200K are "rich" and should pay more, notwithstanding this group pays over 58% of all taxes paid already while earning less than 35% of the total income. And in deterring jobs, also reduces the effective federal taxes paid (by reducing employment). Yet you ask questions that have no bearing on the subject.
David Didier, GA
"Atlas Shrugged" by Ayn Rand should be required reading.
Barb Gibson
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