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Congress Vows To Keep Erectile Dysfunction In America
Submitted by Simon Black of Sovereign Man blog,
I have to start by telling you that I have absolutely no love for big pharmaceutical companies.
Can't sleep? Sleep too much? Stressed out? Need energy? Too much energy? Too fat? They've got a pill for all of that.
Forget about living a healthy lifestyle. They've helped turn practically the entirety of western civilization into a bunch of pill-popping drug addicts who focus on treating symptoms rather than addressing the underlying root cause of disease.
All that being said, I am reminded of a quote by Evelyn Beatrice Hall; in her biography of Voltaire, Ms. Hall wrote "I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it."
I disapprove of much of the way the big pharma industry operates. But I still think they should be free to conduct their business.
But as I was flying in to Santiago from Dallas overnight, I read a troubling story in the Financial Times about Pfizer's bid to take over British drug company AstraZeneca.
One of the prime reasons that Pfizer is so interested is because the takeover would afford them the opportunity to redomicile the business in England.
Why do this? Because right now they're paying US corporate tax... which is substantially higher than in the UK.
So by moving the business abroad, the company would save shareholders billions.
Uncle Sam has a big problem with this. And Congress is jumping all over Pfizer to block the deal... even going so far as to propose RETROACTIVE legislation.
In other words, they're willing to go back in time to kill the deal before it even gets started.
(I'm reminded of the first Terminator movie when I think about this approach...)
The FT quotes Oregon Senator Ron Wyden as saying "I don't approach retroactivity in legislation lightly, but corporations must understand that they won't profit from abandoning the US..."
Ummm, actually that's the whole point, Senator. The tax situation is so onerous that people do profit when they leave the US. That's WHY people leave the US. Duh.
But like the drug companies themselves, Congress isn't looking at the root cause. They're treating the symptom.
In this case, the symptom is American businesses heading overseas to escape the highest tax regime in the developed world.
The federal corporate tax rate alone can be as high as 38%, and that's before including state corporate taxes, or personal taxes on the dividend distributions to shareholders.
And that is precisely the underlying cause: everyone is taxed to the hilt so that the government can continue squandering it all and indebting future generations.
Anyone with the means can see the writing on the wall and is opting out of this system.
Bear in mind that what Pfizer is proposing is completely legal. There are no laws that prevent the company from acquiring another firm and moving the headquarters abroad.
None of this seems to matter.
'Cuz hey, why bother making the tax code more competitive and cleaning up the balance sheet when you can just threaten people at gunpoint?
As much as I dislike the industry, preventing Pfizer from leaving is a form of financial slavery. At a minimum, it's a form of financial repression and capital controls.
And this is something that should concern everyone.
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Fish gotta swim, bird gotta fly, banana republic gotta rule via fiat. With an iron fiat fist.
I got your "root cause"...RIGHT HERE!
Wait a minute... you mean, now I should be concerned?
I agree. Keep it. We (guys) are going to need viagra at some point down the road.
An apple a day keeps the doctor away.
That would be a Pink Delicious Apple?
They're all pink on the inside.
The US gov't has been encouraging corps to move production overseas for cheap labor and manufacturing. Pfizer is just taking it to the final conclusion, move the corporate headquarters. What!? Screwing the average folk is ok, but now they want to move away and take money from our Congresscritters. The nerve! Hypocrisy has no end.
Was ok, for decades... Now, they start to wake up... And want to close the barn door...After most of the horses are gone...Not that I have an answer... Just an observation that they are a few decades late in waking up... Course they were getting their 'brown envelopes'... So, it was ok... I remember in the 60's when consumer electronics started to migrate off shore...Hmmm
This is a pipe dream, where on Earth can any corp $ hide when the shit hits the fan? The Governments will take all of it, one way or another.
.
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"As much as I dislike the industry, preventing Pfizer from leaving is a form of financial slavery."
Pack a suitcase full of hundreds of thousands in cash or gold and try to leave the country. They told us "corporations are people" didn't they? Next time you meet a corporation walkin' down the street put your hand out "Welcome to hell, Reverend."
The USSofA has been making it more and more difficult for people to leave this country and now because they can't tax corps, NO obamma....corps as in corporations NOT corps as in military, enough they are going to try to change the laws retroactively!!!!!!
What a fucked-up bunch of pikers masquerading as representatives.........
HEY....how about retroactively changing the tax law so I only have to pay 5%!!
Actually, Pfizer is not going anywhere. Redomiciling is a corporate paper shuffling routine. A further elaboration of the Double Irish.
Why don't they just declare that all corporations are tax exempt? Because that would put lots of lawyers and former Congressional staffers out of business.
As for Pfizer, their HQ will remain in NYC.
This is just an example of how the Lords get to flee while the fleas continue to foot the bills. And the noise on Capital Hill is merely pre-election dick swinging.
Anyone who thinks Congress will act on this has to be totally naive. This would have as much chance of succeeding as taxing the carry of private equity firms. How is that making out?
Now go and eat your Viagras...
Viagra is for wimps.
Cialis-Four hour boner GUARANTEED or TRIPLE your money back.
Dont need Viagra or Cialis or any chemical pollutants in your body when you have these nice friends from Japan:
http://www.fantasydoll.com.au/
They have a uniquely quiet Beauty and charming attitude, as well as being very cooperative.
Where's Pris?
A boner that burns twice as bright burns half as long....
The boot on your throat just moved to your penis.
How's it feel now?
Well, some folks are in to S&M- I suppose they like it just fine. But......what's the safe word?
Actually, cheapbastard, that doll looks more active than my wife!!!
Excellent WB7. "European in name only" ... while all the know-how and human capital remains right here.
Nothing a little patent protection reduction modification combined with crushing import duties couldn't slove...
Bingo, Zero.
The real crime here is these corporate fucks have sucked us almost dry, and now want to scoot off with no responsibility. I would really like to know what their effective tax rates are. We should have made it very painful for companies to export jobs long ago and stopped all this shit at the border the way the country operated for the first 200 years. Now, any B.O.D. electing to pull this stunt should be stripped of citizenship and booted over to their new country....good ridance. And all you New World Order Free Traders can kiss my ass. I don't need any lectures about what happened in the 30's, either. The decline of America is sickening, and it could have been prevented. There is a reason doors and gates have locks. If you leave valuables unprotected, they will be stolen. Forcing American business to compete with foreign government subsidized companies is simply selling out America.
Too many limp dicks in Congress need Pfizer to stay.
and that's the rub
Oh boy.
Well now I fell relived for not being born in USA and not applying for visa.
the entire planet is downwind from the coming USD meltdown.
Luckily nobody is born in the USA, as it's a body politic, rather than a place.
Sadly though, I think I'm the only person who knows this.
So... whaddaya do?
So Bruce was lying?
What about when they issue your birth certificate (USA not Kenyan)? You could say that is your birth into the USA (corp).
pods
It shows you how the politicians think though...you may think its yours...but they want it all...and they will take it all in the end....right before the crash...as a drowning rat will try to save itself first..by killing you
the doors are being chained. once the .gov goes to battle against the corporations, the times are desparate. they are going after the off shore cash as well.
Batten down the hatches, it's war time.
Why compete when you can just block people from doing anything you don't want? This strategy is historically not great for future prosperity.
CONgress will find a way to allow the merger; the objections are part of the theater.
CONgress loves monopolies, just look at the media mergers and consolidation of the MSM.
No doubt there are wire transfers and Gold bars being made behind the scenes to grease some palms.
Or promises of serving on the Board of Directors and flats in London for when the "honorable" Senators and CONgress critters retire.
"Why do this? Because right now they're paying US corporate tax... which is substantially higher than in the UK."
This confuses the hell out of me. I always hear that big corps in the US don't pay taxes, etc, etc, but here they want to leave for a lower tax rate. Any explanation appreciated in advance.
Every industry has its own loopholes.
You sure wouldn't want a uniform tax code that applied equally to all players, that would kill lobbying and back-scratching as a lucrative industry, cripple the DC economy, and lead to massive lay-offs in our food, beverage, recreational drug and escort industries.
LGBYF and learn that U.S. corprations are taxed heavily, yo.
KPMG's Corporate Income Tax Rate Table:
The corporate income tax rate [In the U.S.] is approximately 40%. The marginal federal corporate income tax rate on the highest income bracket of corporations (currently above USD 18,333,333) is 35%. State and local governments may also impose income taxes ranging from 0% to 12%, the top marginal rates averaging approximately 7.5%. A corporation may deduct its state and local income tax expense when computing its federal taxable income, generally resulting in a net effective rate of approximately 40%. The effective rate may vary significantly depending on the locality in which a corporation conducts business. The United States also has a parallel alternative minimum tax (AMT) system, which is generally characterized by a lower tax rate (20%) but a broader tax base.
In the U.K. the rate is 21%.
40% is confiscatory IMHO. But it keeps prices up, right? Not deflationary I guess.
Oh, so we can expect big price decreases if the merger is allowed?
Hahahahahahahahahahaha
KPMG is preaching their book. I bet Phizer's EFFECTIVE tax rate is somewhere around the same as G.E. --- effectively zero. They have probably figured out how to get subsidies from England and probably with the help of KPMG.
Am I the only one who remembers that "ex post facto" legislation is forbidden in the Constitution? Of course, Ron Wyden has never read the Constitution / thinks he can override it / has no idea it exists, let alone what it prescribes and proscribes, but what the hell!
Fascist companies, fascist legislators, .....
What's a constitution?
JUST USE GINSING, FUCK DC
If I was poisoning as many humans as these coksuckerz I'd get out of the country too.
Pfzer has axed 50,000 jobs since 2005--during a period when it also bought up Wyeth. They will slash more AZ jobs if the merger goes through. Their pipeline is fucked and they need to leech off AZ's which is not much better.
.
Pfizer should hire Joe Biden's Son - or maybe Michelle Obama -
. . . Michelle as the Viagra antidote?
"A form of financial slavery"? Are you fucking kidding me?
Interesting. The UK rub on this take over is Pfizer is some kind of asset stripper bunch of fucks.
Probably not far from the truth!
I know, right? They're really not happy about it. Pfizer historically liquidates its acquisitions.
Interesting. The UK rub on this take over is Pfizer is some kind of asset stripping bunch of fucks.
Probably not far from the truth!
Howzabout a Flat Tax...for Corporations?
If you want your hard-on you can keep your hard-on.
With all of the estrogenic food consumed in North America, and all the skinny-fat schlubs I see walking around, it's a surprise males have any 'equipment', at all.
What if.... Congress enacted corporate tax reform simplyfing and lowering rates. Then they could work the merger the other way and the US would collect more taxes, not less from the combined company. No, sorry, that would be too logical.
People should have started to be concerned DECADES ago, not just now.
I love Simon's podcasts because he has a nice voice
Screw Viagra and Cialis. 500 to 1000 mg of niacin will give you a hot flash, temporary skin flushing and a raging hard on for about 10 cents a dose. Daily doses of niacin also help with depression. WTF DO WE NEED BIG PHARMA FOR?
Thanks for the knowledge. Had no idea :)
--I disapprove of much of the way the big pharma industry operates. But I still think they should be free to conduct their business.--
if you were to let everyone compete on an open playing field, companies such as pfizer - big pharma - would lose their advantage. as it is, they create state-sanctioned drugs; drugs which the government and media say are 'good' while plant-based substances -- mushrooms, weed, opium, etc. are kept as illegal or 'bad'. you can even go into a narcotics anonymous meeting and realize that there are people there who have no problem with state-sanctioned drugs (offerings from pfizer, etc.), but that the real point of NA is to ween the person off of illegalized or 'bad' substances.
so no, it's not at all clear how companies like pfizer should be granted such unnatural monopolies. these companies are like the old-style snake oil salesman, only backed by massive marketing and government force. old-style, roadside snake oil salesmen would actually be an improvement over this.
they want to make their pills? that's fine. but being backed by law enforcement is a load of bunk.
I thought the article was a little thin. Maybe he should have had his pilot re-route to London for more investigation before submitting this artile.
shame astra zenika has not got headoffice in kiev den joe bidens boy r hunter could take it over and sort it out.
those bidens dontes mess about no yes sir ri bob
'Pfizer-- Kelo v. New London' (2005: Eminent Domain?)
http://www.democracynow.org/2009/11/13/eminent
Note: Pfizer walked away once ruling was made... but, the damage was done! Today, they [Pfizer] want all their $$$'s in off-shore ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Double_Irish_Arrangement ) accounts, never to reach taxpayers pockets?!?
This is only the beginning...
Regarding non- erection - isn't that nature's way of telling you that you are not up to it anymore? If that is so, why would one want to take a pill to erect the love engine when the body does not want it? A serious question as statistically there must be many ZHers that have used this pill - why?
Ah, turning on each other. Excellent.
Big Pharma pays a lower tax bill than other major corporations, because they can channel all sorts of marketing into their tax-exempt "R&D" budgets, plus they get big tax breaks for "orphan drugs" that they then charge a patient tens of thousands per year for.
AND most of their research comes from publicly-funded universities.
PLUS they charge Americans more than any other people for their products.
Pfizer moving profits offshore because 'onerous taxation' is chutzpah squared.
Absolutely 100% correct.
Nature's alternative to Viagra is the poison from wandering spiders. If bit by a wandering spider, your dick gets so hard that it's extremely painful. All scientists need to do is water it down.
The alternative is amphetamine. That drug causes extreme hypersexuality.
Cite your sources on this rager-inducing spider elixer. Because... well... a friend of mine is interested in it. Mr. Johnson. Mr. Wandering Johnson.
Watching .gov hurt BigPharma is like watching two spider devour each other. Like, "ewww," then a sort of fascination, mixed wwith the original revulsion.
Fuck em both. Who gives a fuck. Bunch of murderous liars, all.
Pfuck Pfizer
Off shore companies are not american citizens. Cut the cord, charge them 100% tax to re-enter after the shit hits the fan. And no green cards allowed for the C level exec.s.
Fuck the entire oligarchy. Don't buy their corporate shit, don't vote for red team or blue team players, don't be a sheep. If we stop feeding the beast it will starve.