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GAO Reports Bailout and Tech Firms Love Tax Havens

Posted by kdawson on from the how-to-spell-profit dept.

theodp writes "Most of America's largest publicly traded corporations and Federal contractors — including those receiving billions of dollars from US taxpayers to finance their recovery — have set up offshore operations that could help them avoid paying US taxes, according to a GAO study released yesterday. Of the 100 largest public companies, 83 do business in tax-haven hot-spots like the Cayman Islands, Bermuda, and the British Virgin Islands. The report found that Citigroup, a recipient of $45B in bailout funds so far, has set up 427 subsidiaries in tax-haven countries, including 91 in Luxembourg, 90 in the Cayman Islands, and 35 in the British Virgin Islands. Household names on the lists from the tech sector include Apple (1 tax haven subsidiary), Cisco (38), Dell (29), HP (14), Intel (6), IBM (10), Microsoft (8), Motorola (4), and Oracle (77)."

2 of 347 comments (clear)

  1. This isn't new. by owlnation · · Score: 1, Troll

    Sure corporations do this. And not just US ones. And not just corporations, many non-profit organizations also benefit from that status to maximize their revenue.

    Greenpeace, Amnesty International, Mozilla Foundation, Wikipedia and many, more more are just flying non-profit "flags of convenience" to avoid paying taxes on their commercial operations arms.

    The Tax system is deeply flawed, and since it benefits the rich, powerful, and those who aspire to be, it's not going to change any time before Hell freezes over.

  2. Corp Tax take shrinking by EEPROMS · · Score: 1, Troll

    I find it amusing that US politicians are always talking about decreasing personal income tax, at the same time the corporate tax take has gone from 34% (1968) to just 15% in 2008. So who is paying the missing 19% of the tax take pie you may ask ? At the end of the day you and "your children" are as the government prints money and borrows. This gives the wonderful double whammy of an inflated currency (true worth of the currency drops) and a massive debt to pay off (over $3000 per person needs to be spent just to pay the interest every year). So as your tax money is used to bail out companies who pay less than 2% tax on total income thanks to off shored holdings you have to wonder who is getting screwed during this recession.