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How GE Paid A Total Of $5 Billion In Domestic Taxes Between 2002 And 2009 On $639 Billion In Domestic Revenues
One of the more popular topics recently is the collapse in corporate tax revenues, and the resultant push by the administration to ramp up taxation at the corporate level. As Zero Hedge has been disclosing for two months now, it all has to do with the now discredited concept of the "wall of money", which is mostly accumulated offshore and is thus not only available domestically, but is not taxed by the US. However, one company which has somehow managed to slip through the cracks is the infamous General Electric: the company, that in addition to the banks, has been the biggest beneficiary of Obama's taxpayer largesse. Here are the numbers: in the period between 1991 and 2009 GE's pretax income is cumulatively $293 billion on which however the firm has paid only $25.2 billion in current domestic taxes, or a 8.58% cumulative tax rate. Yet where it gets wild is the narrower period between 2002 and 2009, during which timeframe the firm made a generous $164.4 billion in pretax net income (not to mention $639 billion in domestic revenue, just over half of total revenues of $1.2 trillion) it paid only $5 billion in domestic current taxes, or a 3.17% tax rate! So our question to the administration is how does $639 billion in domestic revenue, and $164 billion in total net income, result in $5 billion in taxes? Perhaps if the desperately broke administration is so concerned about refilling its empty coffers, it should first of all look at the most profitable (presumably) company in America... And perhaps CNBC can share some coverage on the topic of its parent company's taxation strategy.
Note the red line below which shows the cumulative domestic current taxes paid by GE in the period 2002-2009, and compare it to the blue line, or total pretax income.
h/t Geoffrey Batt
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Corporations don't pay taxes, their customers do. Corporate taxes should be eliminated entirely.
corporations use infrastructure, hugely. you're an idiot.
Kettle....Pot called, and wants it's personal attack back.
So, GE with its limitless benevolence, would just absorb the cost of any addidtional taxes, and not pass those taxes down to purchasers of their products? Doesn't really matter whether they use infrastructure or not. Our mistake as a nation was building it for them in the first place, the facts are that Corporations DO NOT PAY TAXES. THEY COLLECT THEM.
Exactly, then "purchasers of their products" would be paying for the true cost of production, up front, instead of just part of it, with the rest socialized. And the river wouldn't be filled with 2-headed fish, and the air with particulate carcinogens. Stupid, short sighted argument. And we didn't build the river.
I see you're a man in favor of increased government intrusiveness and bureaucratic complexity. Well, have I got a DEAL FOR YOU!
For I limited time only you can receive a one-way ticket to Pyongyang, home of the ORIGINAL brand of government intrusiveness. Act now, and you can get one extra ration card, redeemable for "food" products, available on the third day of every seventh month on even numbered years. Those lines are long, better get in it now!
wish I could eat some fish out of the Hudson
Too bad socialism ruined it. Maybe capitalism can clean it up?
Sell the land under the water, the owners will want to clean it up, and will force those who are dumping their waste into the river to stop with lawsuits.
The private pond on my Uncle's property isn't polluted, and has plentiful numbers of fish, which he gathers regularly, and has a nice fish fry for the family.
I believe GE is a corporation.
GE isn't in the fishing business. Would you be disappointed if your uncle started taking money to let people dump shit in his pond? You couldn't go to any more fish frys. Alot of people along the Hudson can't either.
Why is your uncle such a socialist?
Not only do they use infrastructure, they also routinely squeeze the public purse for R&D money that they need to stay 'competitive'. There are ways to tax them for anyone with the political will to do so. Small domestic industry remain the biggest employers, and they get squeezed routinely while the big trans-nationals spend money on lobbying.
like, what is the monetary value of the Hudson River?
+35 PCB
Waterways are an interesting case study. Can something so transient, and life giving be owned? Once water is owned, why could it not be "hoarded" by its owners.
If I own a plot of land on the river, and claim the rights to the waters flowing across my land, what is to prevent someone from buying the plot upstream from me, and sequestering that water for his own designs (selling it to me, or using it to make power)?
Edit: To answer your question, it depends on how much you really want that Melamine laced Chinese "baby formula", which was delivered to your front door, right up the Hudson River.
you're making my point. GE moved in upstream from all of us and extracted value by using The Hudson as an industrial sewer, filling it full of PCBs and god knows what else. Yes there's a long tradition of that everywhere. Tragedy of the commons, except little downside for GE. The Commons / Infrastructure needs regulation and maintenance. All users should pay. Proportionately.
What's to stop someone from taking all the air out of the sky?
Private ownership does NOT block commerce, nor does it cause the land to be stricken bare, contrary to popular socialist gibberish.
um, Physics does, but you could argue that that is what is being done in certain areas of the world; clean air, specifically. Right around the port in Oakland for example. Or China, but who gives a shit.
but that's a good example. why don't we privatize 'the air'? Actually we might do that with Cap and Trade. Corporations would buy the rights to the air, so they can pollute it. It's a market solution. They get it for free right now. They are passing part of the cost of doing business off onto people who aren't necessarily their customers, in the form of asthma, lung cancer, acid rain, misery, etc etc etc. That is socialism.
The only gibberish around here is your upchucking of paper thin libertarian dogma soundbites. Libertarianism is infantile. Seriously.
riparian rights? just spitballing here.
Zero, because no-one is allowed to own the land under it.
http://mises.org/journals/scholar/waterprivate.pdf
Oh. So that's settled then. Some dismal scientist from the U of Central Arkansas says water privatization is good. I think GE already owns the Hudson, more like pwoned it. They got it real cheap.
Corporations should be eliminated entirely.
Adam Smith had no room for limited liability vehicles that shield and shift income.
So in that sense I agree with you that corporate taxes should be eliminated.
After the reset this is one of the things that we will need to take a long hard look at.
http://psychonews.site90.net
I'm starting to come around to this viewpoint. By diversifying ownership to infinitesimal proportions, management has been able to significantly enrich itself with little effective oversight (among other factors arguing against corporate liability protection). Why should we create and allow, as a society, entities (corporations) that are so large and powerful that they can direct and control government structures? Eventually (and already) the mega-corporations care more for their own self-perpetuation than for the benefit of their customers and the society at large...
Exactly, more or less.
Whether one is discussing the totalitarian state or the corporate fascist state, it is all about the monopoly on land, capital and knowledge.
Why should one individual be born with one hundred, one thousand or one million times the land, wealth or access to to knowledge than another?
Because the game of the sociopath is to rig anything.....and everything!
Adam Smith's principal text left out many, many crucial subjects as he wanted to continue earning a living and couldn't afford to annoy the oligarchs of his time, hence his refusal to take on the major landowners of that time.
The commenter you are responding to says it all....
Today those in economic power will continue to tax the majority more and more (that is, those who can still and willingly will, pay their taxes) while they destroy the fundamental tax base by offshoring the jobs of said taxpayers, allowing their corporations to forego paying any and all taxes through a myriad means of tax evasion and avoidance (as stated in this blog post, capital offshoring, hiding debt offshore, transfer pricing, profit shifting, etc. etc.) and bowing before the biggest financial scam of all, those very opaque hedge funds.
The three points of the trident used to destroy any and all economies: the offshoring of jobs (and creation of future jobs offshore, FDI), the leveraged buyouts by private equity firms -- and variations thereof (SPAC, etc.), and those hedge funds --- all based upon the ultimate financial scam of securitized financial instruments; securitizations and credit derivatives -- the forever peddling of securitized debt.
I don't have a problem with wealth accumulation per se, as there will always be more productive citizens then others - and that productivity should not be discouraged. My issue, which you allude to, is the system allows or even encourages the accumulation of wealth AND power. Individuals should not have, or be able to develop, structural advantages and preferences. One could design a simple, non-corruptible system that both allowed equal access to the individual but also allowed for and encouraged individuals to develop productivity improvements.
Morons your bus is leaving.
Agree. Think how much more competitive our goods could be if corporations paid no income tax. Although corporations use our infrastructure, we're ultimately the ones who benefit from their production. I've NEVER had a corporation tell me how much better off they were because they had a military presence in Afghanistan.
I haven’t seen cheaper products only higher CEO pay. Could that be where the tax savings went?
where the wealth gap went... it ain't passed on.
Guess you never heard of Halliburton, Lockhhed Martin, Boeing, KBR, Raytheon...
I could go on.
Sure, but GE, AAPL, MSFT, name most other blue chip companies...they all have a subsidiary or other operating office located in a tax haven and hence pay minimal amounts to their actual home country.
Creative accounting FTW.
+++++
Read the post. Over $600 billion in DOMESTIC revenue over the period. Unless you attribute all the COGS, SG&A to America, and have no US net income, this makes no sense. Furthermore, it also means that FASB will likely come up with a way for equitable splits in the cost structure that are actually somewhat close to realty.
Repricing of goods through your off shore tax haven office has been very successful in offsetting profits from domestic sales. I think that is the reference here. Even net profits are allowed to be offset from previous losses. GE has continued to ask for favorable treatment in that area. Re: Hudson river costs.
They're not hiding their mechanism, in fact they pretty much advertise it:
"Our consolidated income tax rate decreased from 2008 to
2009 primarily because of a reduction during 2009 of income in
higher-taxed jurisdictions. This increased the relative effect of
our tax benefits from lower-taxed global operations, including
the decision, discussed below, to indefinitely reinvest prior-year
earnings outside the U.S. because
the use of foreign tax credits no longer required the repatriation
of those prior-year earnings."
Page 30
http://www.ge.com/ar2009/pdf/ge_ar_2009.pdf
...and they give some more guidance on how to "best [analyze]" their effective tax rate:
"The nature of business activities and associated income
taxes differ for GE and for GECS and a separate analysis of each
is presented in the paragraphs that follow.
Because GE tax expense does not include taxes on GECS
earnings, the GE effective tax rate is best analyzed in relation to
GE earnings excluding GECS. GE pre-tax earnings from continuing
operations, excluding GECS earnings from continuing operations,
were $12.6 billion, $14.2 billion and $13.5 billion for 2009, 2008
and 2007, respectively. On this basis, GE’s effective tax rate was
21.8% in 2009, 24.2% in 2008 and 20.6% in 2007"
(Page 31)
....so what is GECS? G.E. Capital Spending aka "Bank of G.E." I think this is where the trickery mostly lies.
I read a nice bloomberg article (it happens every now and then) a few months back about how all the major corporations assign their IP to low-tax haven countries (Ireland used to be popular), and then have domestic operations license the IP - costing domestic operations and profiting tax-haven operations.
Here's a shorter version, http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=newsarchive&sid=aK0aqjwsiSCA. The longer version went through a lengthy example of how a drug company transferred IP-based profits to Ireland.
Of course, your point stands - it makes no sense. It's an obvious, permitted, and even encouraged subterfuge of US tax receipts/payments/laws...
http://www.forbes.com/2010/04/01/ge-exxon-walmart-business-washington-co...
from the article (p.s. a 24k page tax return):
The most egregious example is General Electric ( GE - news- people ). 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.
The term for that is "profit shifting" -- one of hundreds of their tax evasion schemes.
I'm going to assign all my personal intellectual property in my brain to a low tax country and rent it back. Wonder if that would hold up in tax court?
Right, im not disagreeing on how this makes no sense, except its not new, and theres not only a single culprit here.
You can have all the domestic COGS, R&D, G&A expenses in the world. As long as your tax credits add up to make up the larger part of your 'taxable' income, then any taxes you are to pay to your sales country (NOT your HQ as we've discussed) will be virtually nil.
This is the curse of Earnings (and tax) management. Perhaps the accountants are the ones to blame... E-M has gone so far as to have courses named such in b-school - yes, classes that teach you what NOT to do in the professional world. Recently US GAAP and IFRS have been reconciling certain valuation differences - but whether or not FASB will work with the IASB to implement something is questionable.
Imposing burdensome taxes on large, wealthy corporations with overpaid executives will reduce shareholder returns, stifle growth and cause more unemployment.
What's good for the goose is good for the gander. We should just eliminate taxes. (I am not being facetious).
Yes, and it can be done reasonably painless if we scale back the empire.
the credit bubble will not be reblown through a reduction of taxes and, therefore, our ability to repay sovereign debts will not be made reasonable through a reduction of taxes... we have very limited world growth from here, but looming debts from the peak of the bubble... a reduction in taxes hastens our demise at this juncture.
Not if we refuse to accept the fiat debt. Not if we refuse to acknowledge the dollar. This is a debt created by and for bankers- it is a debt best left to them, while we rebuild on a foundation of sound money.
They only have the power we cede to them. Once that spell is broken, they are at the mercy and justice of their neighbors.
if you think that by defaulting on all of our domestic and international debts would be "reasonably painless" then you're fucking crazy. When the amount of production/wealth available on the back side of the collapse is completely insufficient to cover/care for an aging babyboomer population? When the remotely decent security provided by police forces wanes to thugs and gangs? When wellfare and unemployment checks no longer are given? What do you do with the 23% that are unemployed? What does the destruction of the dollar from here do to our gasoline prices and how are the increases transferred to virtually all products?
There is a reason why literally all laws have been thrown to the wind at this juncture... and it's not because we are facing something other than the abyss.... black and unforgiving.
I'm not sure why you threw reasonably painless in quotations, for I never said that. It would be painful, very painful. Exactly how do you think all this is going to end up? With a Disney ending?
However, I will walk through your complaints one at a time. : aging boomers- no money for drugs would probably improve their health or they could become part of a larger family unit to help provide care. Police do not provide decent security- they report after the fact and basically give you a report for the insurance company. They may solve a crime( approx. 17% of the time), but it is always after the fact. No welfare or unemployment- guess what, people have seen this before. Most survived- some even worked. Gasoline- you pay market price, how does that change? If you pay more for gas, you make adjustments in what you spend on.
The abyss may just be a way through to greater liberty and freedom. It is always darkest just before the dawn...
In other words, after collapse, we may eventually build something better, but let's not talk about what happens in the meantime and the pain of transition. Got it.
I agree the abyss MAY just be a way through to greater liberty and freedom. It may also be the cattle corridor leading to our slaughter. Who knows at this juncture.
We have no way of knowing with the exception of the Great Depression. If we use it as a template and then remove that governmental actions that made it worse- we could actually create a better end game. There was much pain and suffering. Still, as a nation we survived.
Did you think we could participate in so much mis-allocation and not pay some penalty? Since the people who benefited the most were the top 1%, perhaps you should direct your exasperation at them and ask for a contribution to the protection of the poor?
The problem is, the market will demand that equilibrium be re-established, whether we like it or not. This will not happen without costs, but the longer we attempt to put it off- the worse the resolution will be. People whom were responsible with their behavior are being negatively impacted- is there fairness in this?
As a society, we can choose our level of charity, but we are well past the point of no pain in terms of debt. Now, it is a question of how much wealth deterioration will be condoned. The more wealth that is transferred, the less will be available to rebuild the economy.
I'm thinking that the collapse of the world's only/reserve currency is going to be something... a little more nasty than the great depression. The question at this juncture is what does the dollar pass the torch to? The answer, obviously, are commodities and PMs and the most durable of goods. But, all potential state contenders are "all in" on the dollar... every sovereign that could possibly be our successor has pledged their lives to maintaining the status quo and thus our currency. As a result, when we go, they all go.
I guess my point is, the collapse of the world's only/reserve currency, all things considered, is going to be different than the collapse of A currency among many... I suspect too, that the eventual pain will be far greater.
Again, the reason we ran into a debt brick wall was because our resources and production couldn't keep up. This raises the point of what kind of world will there be post collapse when the credit gets removed? We're going to peel back decades for sure (already have in many areas) and potentially centuries. This isn't mere pain, this is pandemonium and anarchy. I hope we have the resolve to rebuild.
Wadday don't pays in taxes, they doles out as campaign contributions.
QED
And what isn't contributed to politicians, or paid in tax, is paid to CEOs who sit on 8 other boards, where they vote for compensation increases as long as their back is scratched in return.
If shareholders can't impose limits on these a**holes then the law will have to. I say we bring these clowns salaries back to 1970 levels, indexed for the average worker's pay rise.
My, what patriots! Outsourcing jobs AND paying no taxes! God Bless America!
Rogerwilco
The income tax is not what most believe it to be. You mean free "people" that have no benefit from working underneath a corporate veil should NOT be taxed. Corporations are creatures of the state and can be taxed to death if "The People" deem them to be taxed.
Way to go Jack!
ya anti-American loser
You can name your book "winning", but history will remember you for corporate "leechfucking" of America.
Oh but don't you listen to the campaign commercials? Corporations are overtaxed. That's the source of all our problems. The more of this I see the more I become convinced that the only way forward is to let the current system fall of its own weight. What a disaster.
whuups..definitive proof that the american tax payer is a stooge? (this wasn't supposed to get out)..well it's only a tin foil hat crowd..it can be fu-fu-ed away..nothing to see here..
In 2009, Exxon made a mind-boggling $35 billion in profit - one of the largest corporate profits in history.
It paid $0 taxes to the US government.
If you're super bored: http://www.gao.gov/new.items/d09157.pdf
Go to page 23 and check out all the subsidiaries that Bank of America has in tax friendly countries. It has three in Mauritius, and 59 in the Cayman Islands. In total it has 115 subsidiaries set up to help avoid taxes (or perhaps their Keep the Change program is more popular in Mauritius than I thought.)
On page 25, Citigroup shows 427 subsidiaries, including 91 in Luxembourg and 15 in Mauritius.
Countrywide Financial shows a subsidiary in Mauritius and 2 in Guernsey. I wonder how many home equity lines they do there?
Someone at ZeroHedge should do some forensics on this.
I think it would be easier to just outlaw incorporation in general. No more corporate veil. If you want to own something, then you have to be responsible. No more creating and perpetuation of sociopathic by definition entities.
We definitely need more accountability in business and in politics.
someone said we should require every internet user to use their real name online, we'd have a lot less shenanigans too. Obviously this is theory.
Eliminate all (corporate and personal) income current taxes & fees and go with a straight consumption tax. Problem eliminated.
A severe whittling down of regulations, rules, laws, is definitely in order.
Tax reform is necessary, but as you have put it, simplicity is what is called for.
And the idea of being able to make up your own rules, as long as you are backed up by an army of lawyers, definitely has to go.
Fair tax, baby.
No thanks. Brutally progressive, and I'm still filing returns and my 4th and 5th amendment rights are still being trampled.
What's new...as long as loopholes exist to reduce taxes corporations will utilize.
and yet look just how well that stock has done in the last 5 years.
IMHO, Corporations are not bad, evil or whatever you would like to call it. It more stems from the fact that no anti-trust laws have been enforced in the past 100+ years. Maybe some BS microsoft crap with IE, but the market took care of that anyways. The fact that taxes are so enormous creates this beast that only allows people who "cheat" to survive, and any small business "corporation" without 5000000000 CPA's that can't shift income around 35e^10 times through islands is paying 40% of their income on top of tons of other stupid regulations that shunt growth.
/end rant
Bankruptcy is the best anti-trust law. Failure is the best form of regulation.
Agreed, but we don't allow that either.
When corporate taxes and the rates on wealthy individuals were MUCH higher, we had better, more stable economies and much better wage structure. Then we tinkered with it and find ourselves in a horrible mess.
But yet we still have people who believe the problem is still TAXES ARE TOO HIGH, totally ignoring the historical fact that lowering taxes has caused great HARM.
Do you have any sources? I completely disagree.
"Do you have any sources? I completely disagree."
Try the frigging library or pick up any book, you moron.
(Geez, I'm so fed up with these arbitrary, time-wasting twits who require you to waste your valuable time in convincing them that we are carbon-based life forms.)
I tend to agree with your argument on taxation but generally if you make such a statement it deserves at least one link for the opposing side to review. Otherwise don't bother to post. Let's all strive to raise the level of conversation on ZH and cite sources as much as possible.
http://www.ibtimes.com/articles/47493/20100830/correlation-income-tax-rate-tax-receipts-and-gdp.htm
"Let's all strive to raise the level of conversation on ZH and cite sources as much as possible."
Normally, I'd agree with you. But when there has been countless articles, books, media shows, blog posts, etc., etc., ad infinitum, on this point, and someone acts as if it is an entirely new item, and can't be bothered to do a modicum of reading or research on their own, they are most likely a paid time waster on the payroll of the Business Roundtable, Financial Services Roundtable, National Association of Manufacturers.
Or an e-bot.....
sgt_dumb, you are clearly a follower. Lets analyse your statement. When tax rates where much higher the economy was more stable. I will assume, for the sake of discussion, you are assuming a cause an effect correlation. If so, you clearly lack the mental capacity of a Brazilian gnat. Just because two things happen simultaneously does not signify cause an effect. It would be like me saying:
When womin werent allowed to vote our money was as good as gold, therefore lets stop letting the dang womin folk vote!!!
And even if there is a correlation between two events, it does not mean that the correlation is in the direction you claim:
"It rains and I'm sad, therefore my sadness makes it rain"
Clearly not the case. So lets look at the linked article. Despite the claim that the link supports the notion that higher taxes create a more stable economy, its so funny that it does not say any such thing. At bests it claims a probability of a relationship between secular trends and GDP growth that is not impacted by tax rates. It tries to disconnect the notion of lowering taxes could result in higher GDP by using a single period in time, post WWII US economy an claiming that since taxes edged higher and the GDP still increased, it most mean that tax rates and GDP are not connected. Not even your idiotic claim that higher taxes= higher GDP. Just that they are not correlated. But lets look at the secular factors that influenced US GDP after WWII.
Hmmmm, what could it be, By Golly I got it!!! WWII!!
Europe was in shambles. They had no factories left and needed to rebuild their countries. The US had a ton of factories and could provide all that was needed to rebuild. Presto Chango!! higher GDP. WOW
Kind of owning the only TP store in Juarez.
Obviously, the good Jesuits taught me after always asking the next question, to always bear in mind, "Post hoc ergo propter hoc."
Therefore, I am assuming nothing correlates without supportive data.
You, on the other hand, appear to be indifferent or oblivious to the countless examples over the past ten years, thirty years, one hundred years, and one thousand years, that the concentration of wealth is the ultimate progress killer.
'Nuff said in any warranted response to such silly commentary on your part......
Once again, this article leads me back to the flat tax.
That simple invention. Everyone pays a fair share. We shit can that 2500 piece of garbage called a tax code, get rid of a million accountants and millions IRS enforcers and every one participates financially. I once read where fully 70% of corportae America pays no tax at all. But those IRS pricks hound my lowly ass for 5k grand on the 12% interest option.
A flat, fair tax, would eliminate a lot of the cronyism and robbery that CONGRESS doles out to themselves and their elite buddies.
These crooks would find a way to have both a flat tax and all the existing taxes. Though I do agree a flat tax or VAT would be the best solution, ONLY if the existing tax structure was eliminated.
Agree with the need to nuke the existing tax structure. A VAT is just as insidious as the current system. What people pay in taxes needs to be 100% visible to them at time of payment. None of this automated witholding crap, which is merely a ploy to keep the torches, and pitchforks safely stashed in the proles' closets.
I would prefer a Flat Tax, or Sales Tax/Fair Tax. The mechanisms for collection of sales taxes are already in place in most states. At this point, I am for anything that doesn't require me to do the government's paperwork for them every April 15th, and jump through a bunch of hoops (like collecting receipts, and tracking mileage) to get back my own money.
I'll take either a flat tax or the Fair Tax. Anything, as long as it's simple enough to have the entire tax code on a sheet of paper and there are no loopholes for anyone.
Flat taxes benefit those with the most disposable income. It has the sound of fairness, but that is the point and why Forbes was such a proponent. If you make a million and are taxed 10%. You are left with 900,000. If you make 50,000 and are taxed 10% you are left with 45,000. If the cost of living for a family of four = 45,000 wow. You break even.
The wealthy are given a choice on just how decadent to make their lives, even though the greatest percentage of taxes are used to protect their wealth. Police, Fire, Military, Courts and the Government that writes the laws they tell them to to give them greater and greater advantages.
That is the problem with a flat tax. The real fair system is no tax. Then those whom incur costs will be forced to pay for them, not socialize it across all income groups.
Agreed with you all the way up to, "The real fair system is no tax."
Then how do we pay for social services? And don't answer, "there are no public goods." We all know you gotta pay for military, courts and roads somehow. We all benefit from these things. How to pay for them fairly?
If you still disagree with my position (i.e., we need some taxes) then please provide an example of the last successful society with "no tax."
The last successful society with no personal income tax was the US prior to 1913.
How do we pay for social services? we don't. Military, courts and roads would be paid for privately, by those that deem them necessary and profit from them. These services have been provided by private enterprise before and can be in the future. You may prefer that these costs be socialized, but I don't.
The government can only add cost. Individuals are just as capable of providing services of all types and at costs that are less than those from government.
You assume people want to pay for services. I don't. Nor do I want to take advantage of them. When you borrow, you are beholden. I do not want to be beholden to government.
OK, you didn't say "no INCOME tax". You simply said "no tax" without futher qualification, hence my question.
I agree, income tax was introduced in 1913 and life has sucked since then.
As for courts and military and other "public goods", you do benefit from them whether you realize/admit it or not so you should pay something for them. Otherwise go move somewhere else (Sudan comes to mind).
Arguing there are no social goods deserving taxpayer funding is an infantile exercise. Go take a real Micro and Macro class or at least watch these DVDs (I recommend Economics by Tim Taylor):
http://www.teach12.com/tgc/courses/Courses.aspx?ps=901
The argument is not whether you benefit, but whether the same goods can be supplied privately at less cost and with greater liberty. Why should I go someplace else? I was born here. Should I suffer tyranny because YOU think it is preferable.
I am arguing from a viewpoint of anarcho-capitalism. Perhaps if you would look beyond Keynsian nonsense, you will find that there are other explanations of micro and macro economics.
You assume you inhabit an intellectual high ground without knowing my background economics. Your ignorance should have been your first clue...I prefer the schools that begin with Cotillion and Say, not Smith and Ricardo; Mises and Hayek not Mill and Keynes: Rothbard and Bastiat not Friedman and Samuelson.
Perhaps you should take a class.
read your Machiavelli . Never use mercenary armies.
and Libertarianism IS infantile. Well not quite infantile. More like precocious 4 year old-ile.
I want pizza for dinner every goddamn night, and goddamn you to hell for even trying to stop me! I will pay for it myself with birthday money. I reject all of your arguments and demand liberty!
Reminds me of Stewie.
Libertarianism is the ID of economic dogma. At some point the superego has to rein in that scatological, mommy-fucking bullshit and be adult.
"I am arguing from a viewpoint of anarcho-capitalism"
What an uber-douche. Advanced economic theory is not a valid study of anything. It's not a hard OR soft science. It's theology. My apologies to all the theology majors.
So, your argument is that if I can afford to pay for pizza every night and choose to do so, I'm infantile for not submitting to your higher judgement that I shouldn't have the pizza I desire and can afford to pay for? That somehow a more mature person would just realize the superiority of your intellect and submit to your better judgment even though you are not responsible financially or otherwise for my decisions?
OK, from the bottom of my infantile heart; Fuck you Caesar!
Ah, an intellectual. Your arguments slay me...Machiavelli- a Venician operative is the fount of all wisdom? Good luck with that.
Anarcho- capitalism is not necessarily Libertarianism- so please do no mix the terms. There is a problem with getting what you want and paying for it? It would be better to be told what I want? Your totalitarian bent is enlightening...
Then, the ultimate form of debate- name calling. Advanced economic theory is obviously useless in the face of such overwhelming and logical defense of your viewpoint. Because it is so much better to call me a super douche, which by the way is probably much more useful than your response has been.
Paying your own way is responsibility. Knowing your wants and needs is the product of study and determination- traits associated with being an adult. Being cared for by the state and dependent on its' generosity seems infantile to me.
Lots of name calling lately...
I wonder how much it costs welfare admin to distribute a dollar in benefits? $.50? $1.00? I bet Visa/Amex could do it for pennies.
The 14th amendment is a farce. Humans are free the day they are born. Corporations are NOT persons. They should be disbanded every several years, and taxed heavily, like they were before the amendment that gave corporations citizenary rights. They would still be held accountable for actions such as polluting the water supply.
The trick is that the federal income tax, the 16th amendment, is illigal. People should not be taxed on their labor. If a CEO wants to take home a large sum of monie, fine, but he will have to answer to his employees if he takes too much.
There is no income tax on a person's labor unless that labor comes from the protection of operating as a corporate officer, thereby eliminating personal responsibility.
Most people have no idea what the income tax is, you are closer than most but still off.
Mako,
I see you get it. I am still wrapping the whole idea around my head that since we have both birth certificates and SS #'s we are now under corporate (statutory) law ourselves. There are no more sovereign persons we are all governed by statutory laws and contracts.
For the rest of you:
The whole tax the rich thing is getting old. Start your own damn corporation and begin benefiting from the "loopholes" they throw at the corporate entities. You are allowed to do it. Just because you are afraid is no longer a valid reason not to try.
Clever. But why not, instead of pretending to be a corporation, be a human. Humans are inherently free! The gov issues you a piece of paper. They say, "You are under our laws." You say, "I am under no one. I answer to myself and my peers. You answer to my laws. This is my country."
Paper does not dictate reality.
http://www.globalstrategicadvisors.com/services/domestic-wealth-planning/creating-the-right-business-entity/what-entity-is-right-for-you.html
A person choosing an entity chooses a jurisdiction. This jurisdiction, whether offshore or domestic, must follow the laws and tax codes of that jurisdiction. The principles of the company must not only follow the jurisdictional laws, but also the laws of their citizenship and residency. This often results in very high taxation and sometimes-double taxation.
Serfs... by any other name
Blankman
You do not owe income tax because of BC or SSN. This is the lie patroit nuts want you to believe. You don't owe income tax because your rights come from God. The problem I see is people don't understand the legal process, and eventually will go to jail because they don't understand the Law.
If one is trying to prove they don't owe an income tax in a court, the defendant is most probably drowning in equity for which has no standing in Law.
That is the way it should be, assuming that governments have a right to impose a corporate veil in exchange for money. Seems too much like an indulgence to me.
If you want to risk no more than your initial investment, buy a bond offering. If you want a perpetual share of the profits that can grow, then you have to assume some of the responsibility for whatever the company is doing to provide you with those profits. This enforces investment based on morality, and puts an end to much of the corporate nonsense that is running amok in the world.
^^Corporations are NOT persons.^^ +1000
"I see in the near future a crisis approaching that unnerves me and causes
me to tremble for the safety of my country. As a result of the war,
corporations have been enthroned and an era of corruption in high places
will follow, and the money power of the country will endeavor to prolong
its reign by working upon the prejudices of the people until all wealth
is aggregated in a few hands and the Republic is destroyed.
I feel at this moment more anxiety for the safety
of my country than ever before, even in the midst of war.
God grant that my suspicions may prove groundless"
- Lincoln to (Col.) William F. Elkins, Nov. 21, 1864
http://www.ratical.org/corporations/Lincoln.html
Did you know that John Wilkes Booth's family were not just traveling actors, but the most popular in their day? The patriarch of the family and the family themselves were a fixture of the scene much as the Barrymores today. Rich and for their day absurdly famous.
Good thing Barak was reading Lincoln when he was steppin' into office.
"What have you been doing to prepare for the Presidency?" a reporter asks the incoming President.
"I have been reading a lot of Lincoln."
He lies! He reads teleprompters only...maybe cocktail notes by Z-Big.
Government exists to protect the interests of the businesses that are big enough to provide lots of jobs and can afford all sorts of regulatory costs. Everyone else can take a hike. That's why government is a sham. Always has been, always will be.
In the naive analysis one would be pissed off that a mega rich corporation is getting off the hook on taxes. The truth of the matter however is that corporations are comprised of human beings just like governments, and all taxation is an exercise in one group of people using brutal force against another group of people in order to take their property. Any right thinking person therefore is forced to oppose all taxation on moral grounds.
That's not to say the same corporations should not be challenged on the grounds that they receive stolen property from the government in the form of subsidies and tax breaks. Rather than adopting a "theft in retaliation for theft" attitude though, it would be far more productive if we forced the government to stop stealing from everyone, period.
GE has contributed a lot to the Obozo Administration: They owned and operated North Korea TV, d.b.a. MSNBC, home of Chris "a tingle runs up my leg when I hear Obama speak" Mathews.
A tingle runs DOWN my leg when I hear Obama speak as I piss my pants realizing how screwed we are.
Is that pissing with Honor?
I don't know if there's anything honorable about it but it's damned annoying.
Maybe Barama can speed-dial Immelt and aks him?
GE employees and affiliated PACs gave more than $3m dollars in political donations in 2008 (of which 2/3 went to the Dems), and will spend north of $20m in lobbying this year. They stand to profit big time if high-speed rail and Cap-n-Trade go through in addition to that little tax thingy.
If an alternative minimum tax is good enough for us, it should be good enough for them. If they don't like , they are free to leave the country being the gloablists that they are.
many people wanted the so-called "free market" well here it is.
Corporations are all part of the structure to take the value that people produce and save and send it upwards (owner/investor/billionaire class). I wonder how much money GE made in sales/contracts with the government over that same period?
Who has resources/links to setting up offshore businesses? especially online businesses?
Abolish all taxes of every kind at all levels. Replace with user fee on value of transactions of .1%. Total annual transaction value is about $4Q * .001 = $4T
We could start a bit higher, until debt repaid.
Or go to .5%, and pay every man woman and child a nice dividend of $1200/mo. Might help pay a mortgage or two.
Edit: Oh, and corporations have to go. Talk about the creepy undead. Their blight is the real zombie apocalypse.
Aaah, GE - the other Vampire Squid, remember?
More than $20 Billion (directly) in government contracts:
http://www.governmentcontractswon.com/search.asp?pg=1&type=dc&criteria=GENERAL+ELECTRIC&rc=69&prevpage=2
But when they're not sucking Uncle Sam's dick directly, they make subsidized deals like this one:(http://www.windpowerengineering.com/news/general-electric-recieves-1-4-billion-wind-turbine-contract/)
They've even acquired quite a taste for foreign government dick:
http://www.thestreet.com/story/10453448/ge-wins-3-billion-iraq-contract.html
(although I'm not sure Iraq counts as a foreign government)
When CEO Jeff Immelt's not busy cooking the books, and lying about how much cash GE has (http://acrossthestreetnet.wordpress.com/2009/03/08/can-you-say-fiduciary/), he relaxes as a director of the New York Fed(http://www.ny.frb.org/aboutthefed/org_nydirectors.html), lobbies for cap and trade (http://newsbusters.org/blogs/jeff-poor/2009/05/20/ges-jeff-immelt-global-warming-compelling-cap-trade-most-effective-way-go), and shows up at the white house for free grub. It's rumored that he will replace Larry Summers, and why not? If anybody can teach the administration how to rack up astronomical debt (half a trillion, in GEs case) and still pretend that you can pay it back, it's Jeff.
Sure GE doesn't PAY taxes, they've discovered it works out a lot better for them to take tax money. The funniest part is when the apparently completely senile, former CEO Jack Welch goes on CNBS and talks about, wait for it, Capitalism like it's something he knows about. Personally, I'd rather listen to Barney Frank talk about eating pussy.
But hey, although they don't pay taxes, GE still gives the government money in the form of fines:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/industry/5973762/GE-fined-50m-over-alleged-accounting-fraud.html
http://www.breakbulk.com/compliance/ge-fined-us23-million-over-iraq-bribery-charges
....and to make sure that those fines get paid, the FDIC guaranteed $139B of GE's debt...
With "great American companies" like this, we don't need enemies.
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