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Battle Lines Being Drawn As Obama Plans To Curb Tax Avoidance
theodp writes "Barack Obama has squared up for a major battle with big business, announcing a crackdown on offshore tax avoidance and evasion by US multinationals that's designed to raise $210B and make it easier for companies to create 'good jobs here at home'. Obama cited a building in the Cayman Islands where more than 18,000 US companies are housed: 'Either this is the biggest building in the world or it is the biggest tax scam in the world,' he said. 'I think the American people know which it is.' The administration says that more than a third of US foreign profits in 2003 came from Bermuda, the Netherlands and Ireland, and noted US companies paid an effective tax rate of just 2.3% on the $700bn they earned in foreign profits in 2004. Among tech companies affected by the crackdown, Microsoft joined 200 companies who signed a letter complaining that the proposed tax changes would put them at a disadvantage with their rivals, Cisco moaned that the measures 'would adversely impact our ability to invest and grow our business in the US,' and Google declined to comment for the time being."
two ways to solve the tax "scam"
1. raise overseas tax
2. lower domestic tax
guess which road the government takes.
I'm not a big fan of the system, but fixing it is a big step in the right direction. I wonder if/when we'll see the EU do the same thing (e.g. with Monaco).
For every problem, there is at least one solution that is simple, neat, and wrong.
What does he think is going to happen? These evil rich businessmen are going to go out and deliver pizzas in their free time to pay the extra taxes? Corporate taxes are exactly the same as raising income tax, except you are paying at the point of purchase rather then the point of earning. The only real point of corporate taxes is to give the government the ability to punish companies that fall out of favor.
Paying taxes to buy civilization is like paying a hooker to buy love.
So when is Obama going to go after tax cheats like Tim Geithner, Tom Daschle, Nancy Killefer, and Hilda Solis?
Oh, right. Those tax cheats he nominated for cabinet positions. What a hypocrite.
For the infrastructure they use, for the costs they incur upon citizenry, for the government support they receive regularly, and the bailouts they get surprisingly often?
About. Fucking. Time.
The common citizen pays far too much of the tax burden, while the corporate "citizen" reaps too many of the benefits. The more they weasel out of, the more we, the people, have to pay.
The stock market went up today.
This should really be viewed as a Return To Normality, or the removal of the corrupt tax avoidance schemes that the Talibangelists put in place.
To have a battle, you need to be fighting. The media just want to sell ads.
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
For starters, maybe if corporations started paying their taxes, we could take down the debt some, or maybe we could lower taxes on the rest of us. I don't feel bad for the corporations, maybe they'll just have to forgo paying their executives their excessively huge salaries.
Also, every time Obama does something wrong, we see a bunch of people making sarcastic comments here on how Obama represents "change we can believe in". I do not agree with everything he has done, but I do like to see this sort of thing, he seems like he is honestly trying to run the government in a fiscally responsible way. That's a big difference from our previous president who refused to cut spending to pay for his tax cuts, and even refused to allow the cost of his several hundred billion dollar unnecessary war to be included in the normal budget. We're all paying for that kind of "limited government" now, as will be our children and grandchildren.
Gentlemen! You can't fight in here, this is the war room!
This is the major problem with the political system. The people voted for change - news flash here, there won't be any change except what is left in your pocket. The machine must be fed. The US tax code is so bloated and filled with special interest deals that unless government shrinks, TAXES WILL GO UP! This is a Demopublican problem. There is no differences between the parties - and they are partying on your money.
If you push on the balloon it will expand somewhere else.
Buckle in, this is not going to change unless all the bastards are thrown out, ALL OF THEM!
"I say we take off, nuke the site from orbit. It's the only way to be sure."
And of course we can expect this to work flawlessly, and won't make businesses avoid the US, just like other great laws such as SOX.
How about lowering taxes and making the tax code simpler, so theres not all these loopholes and thus no reason to have the offshort accounts.
Complicated tax codes create the loopholes that allow this to happen, and this legislation will only make more of them.
They'll have to. Their business model depends on being able to "compete" with lower prices by cheating on their taxes. Money which could have been used to keep your children healthy, or educate them, or yes, even fight terrorism. What's worse, they did it so much that now the apparently depend on it.
If you can't make a profit playing by the rules then stop trying to make a profit and die. That's how the system is supposed to work, isn't it? (Whether or not that's a dumb idea is an entirely different debate...)
CAn'T CompreHend SARcaSm?
Maybe the government should break out the antitrust laws as well, so when companies do decide to increase prices consumers will have
cheaper alternatives.
The best education consists in immunizing people against systematic attempts at education. - Paul Feyerabend
Most of those Bermuda/Cayman holding companies exist not to avoid taxes entirely, but rather to keep the US from double-taxing profits that have already been taxed once by Europe/Asia, which is what the US does when this offshore trick isn't used.
It seems likely to me that if US companies can't do that any longer, many will cease to be US companies. It's not that hard to move HQ to Ireland or Canada or wherever. Then the US can become a nation of grunt workers while the real power and intellect (and taxable personal income) is abroad.
This may be the best summary of the M-Theory I've heard.
With the "free" (read "internationally managed") trade agreements we have with foreign nations, I don't think "fixing" these "loopholes" will have the effect this administration desires. "Fixing" these "loopholes" and thus increasing the over all tax burden of a corporation may have quite the opposite effect.
If it becomes more lucrative and less of a tax burden to be a foreign business inside one of these countries with managed trade agreements instead of a domestic one, what will happen? The business will move because tariffs and import taxes become cheaper than domestic ones. That means unemployment grows and tax revenues drop.
This administration would be well served to tread lightly, and ensure that conducting business withing the U.S. is cheaper than foreign alternatives, else the U.S. may find itself with very little businesses conducting any business at all.
Be Safe! Sleep with a Marine. Semper Fi!
It is not the case that "usually" lowing taxes increases revenue. It hasn't seemed to work too well for the last several rounds of tax cuts. Certainly there is a point where lowering taxes reduces total revenue. That point is a tax rate somewhere between 0 and 100%; where? That's up for debate.
Many economists would argue we passed that point some time ago.
SirWired
This is more or less what's happenning to the USA as a whole. American companies simply cannot compete against foreign companies, that's why the industrial sector is moving to Asia. It's useless to say "stop trying to make a profit and die", they died a quarter century ago.
It's the US government at all levels, federal, state, and local, that should learn to live by the rules. When the corporations are moving overseas to places with lower taxes this means your taxes are too high, you should cut government spending and taxes at the same time.
The race to lower taxes is a race straight to the bottom. Businesses will continue to use tax havens as long as there is any benefit to doing so, and the simple fact is that a big economy like the USA cannot afford to lower tax rates to what a little place like the Cayman Islands can charge, e.g. basically nothing.
A better solution is to change conflict laws to ignore the formal jurisdiction of incorporation and instead use the primary place of business. Want to be a Cayman corporation? Then move your ass to the Cayman Islands, along with your entire family. Otherwise, you will be taxed based on where your company really is headquartered. This is something that the major economies of the world can cooperate to make happen, and we don't have to drop our taxes into the toilet to do it.
I think you're wrong about that trade law, mostly because the tax havens don't have any actual trade to use as a threat. Switzerland, Cayman Islands, Isle of Man, Jersey, Ireland, Luxembourg - these are the little countries that are holding the tax policies of the rest of the world hostage. Trade war? What trade war?
These States function exactly as tax heavens not only for foreign companies...
Mod parent up. People who want to raise taxes on evil "big business" seem to not understand that the end result is that those evil "big businesses" will have to fire people or increase their prices to remain competitive successful.
Big businesses employ big numbers of people. This concept is lost on most Democrats and populists that scapegoat big corporations. You can't just blame big companies for everything and expect that they'll ignore this and carry on!
Here in Wisconsin we are looking at a number of laws that will substantially increase taxes on corporations doing business in the state. As a direct result of the anti-business climate in the state, a number of businesses have either relocated operations that were in Wisconsin or actively decided to decline to locate their headquarters in the state -- for example, our famous Miller Brewing Company, formerly headquartered in Milwaukee, merged with Coors of Denver and decided to relocate their headquarters to Chicago.
Name 3.
everything in moderation
Companies that cheat a country out of taxes should be barred from selling their products in that country. My guess is that if North America and Europe signed a treaty to that effect (pay your taxes or else you can't operate here), we'd suddenly see a large increase in tax revenue. It's hard to make a profit after you lose 1.2 billion potential clients.
I came here for a good argument
He had people to do those things.
Also, he should be able to ask them, "Any skeletons in your closet that would make nominating you a risky move?" and expect to get a straight answer.
Seriously, no. There are things you try before war. For example, cutting off their access to the world financial network. Passing law in your home state to not recognize any corporations housed in a foreign tax harbor, or to charge them triple or quadruple their purported taxes, or to charge them as if they were located in the United States, with a 1% administrative surcharge--unless their business is convincingly and legitimately located in the country in question.
You do not START A WAR, even with a country with barely a military to speak of, if you have reasonable alternatives. Further, the alternatives are better for our tax structure and don't penalize legitimate businesspeople in those states.
It's funny listening to Obama preaching about raising taxes. Assuming American companies said "Gee, Obama is right, we should pay more taxes!", which companies does Obama think could afford to pay those taxes?
Even with the existing tax havens, traditional American companies like GM and Chrysler are going broke and selling their bits and pieces to foreign companies. How many trillions have the US federal government paid in the last six months to save American corporations?
Oh, OK, go ahead, raise those taxes. Raise $200 billion more in taxes and pay $200 billion more in bailouts, is that how it's supposed to work?
And actually, the evil businesses he is targeting are not cheats. They followed the law to the letter. Blame congress for leaving the loop holes.
Tim Geithner, Tom Daschle, Nancy Killefer, and Hilda Solis are tax cheats. The law was clear, but they were too important to follow it.
When Fascism comes to America, it will call itself Anti-Fascism, and tell you to give up your guns.
Right, because he has a very large staff who's job is to carefully investigate the finances of everyone he nominated.
It's called the Vetting Process.
-----
"Fairness" is Marxism dressed in drag.
When Fascism comes to America, it will call itself Anti-Fascism, and tell you to give up your guns.
Tax "avoidance" is legal. You "avoid" being liable for a sales tax when you decide to skip purchasing a pack of gum. Only a moron pays taxes he can reasonably avoid. Since when does doing the same make a corporation evil?
Don't be surprised if making it harder to avoid taxes forces companies and jobs out of the country. Companies that have that option are already planning to move.
And for the companies that can't move, as the folks above point out, the consumer always pays the cost of doing business, taxes included.
Just to show that you aren't a total hypocrite, how about you ask the IRS to examine the last few years of your taxes. Remember, by your standards, any mistake that they find is in indication of your own own criminal intent.
> Blame congress for leaving the loop holes.
No, thank them. Obama, being a fool, is about to learn why those loopholes exist. We put them in to keep some of the multinationals headquartered here in the US in practice by allowing them to headquarter on paper somewhere else and we all agreed to ignore the oddities that followed from that. Forced to actually choose many will opt to close up the skyscraper here and open one up in a more business friendly climate. Then profits from US operations will flow OUT instead of overseas profits flowing IN. I'm failing to see how the US wins.
This trend is going to be accelerated by the overthrow of the rule of law implied in the auto bailouts, etc. When the workers are running around seizing the means of production smart people start looking to get out while they can.
Democrat delenda est
Well the point is that he plans to close those loopholes. But generally speaking, when you use a loophole to get around a rule, you're behaving unethically. I think it's reasonable to be upset at the businesses for that.
Who do you suppose lobbied for and were given all those tax breaks and loopholes? Mom & Pop's Bike Repair? Wasn't me. How about you?
If you want your life to be different, live it differently.
No. No, no, no, no, no.
They *think* they depend on it. The big shots at big companies live big lifestyles and they've brainwashed not only themselves but everyone else into believing that they have some sort of immutable right to keep those lifestyles even if earned by deception, incompetence, or just plain circumstance. Remember the huge corporate bonuses paid by companies who received federal bailout money? It was amusing to watch the companies defend those:
Corps: These bonuses support families who are used to 7-digit incomes, you wouldn't take that away from them, would you?"
Gov't: Yes, we would.
Corps: Oh. But we can't take away the bonuses anyway because we'll get sued.
Gov't: Okay, we'll tax the executives directly to get the bonuses back.
Corps: Well, if the bailout money can't go straight into our own pockets then I guess we don't want it anyway.
This, I suspect is something like how the big businesses will react to actually having to pay taxes like everyone else. It has always disturbed me that in the U.S., a corporation is legally considered a person only when it favors them and a faceless unaccountable bureaucracy when it doesn't. It's about time that we stop allowing them to have it both ways.
And if these multinational companies pay exactly zero in taxes, what is the big advantage to having them "headquartered" here in the first place?
"But this one goes to 11!"
Right. At some point a bunch of congressmen sat down and decided the most logical thing to do would be to put in some tax loopholes to keep those multinationals here. Right.
In the real world, what actually happened was that some lobbyists drafted a bill that a congressman put forward, and then everyone voted 'aye' because they were scared of loosing campaign donations. Also in the real world, there's a fair bit of evidence that companies headquarter in places with the deepest talent pools, regardless of local tax rates. I think if you look at states with high tax rates, you'll see that they also contain a fair number of large businesses.
Well gee, maybe the hundreds of employees who work, eat, and live near these headquarters.
Assuming of course that at least some of them pay taxes...
Roughly half my comments are never submitted. You may be reading the better half...
Because being lobbied by an American corporation sounds a lot better than being lobbied by a foreign corporation?
Because along with the headquarters goes a lot of jobs and money. If company X moves it's headquarters from Chicago to Madrid (making stuff up), what do you think is going to happen to all of the employees? Sure, some of the Executives will move out of the country and retain their posistions. But the middle management and grunts will end up on unemployement. What happens to the local market with the loss of those jobs and the emoney they spent in the local community?
Spelling and Grammar errors have been added to this post for your enjoyment
The above mentioned did not make mistakes. They knew they owed taxes but decided not to pay them.
This is true, and they remain blameless up until the point they either
1. Pay lobbyists andor Congress to advocate laws creating those tax loopholes, or
2. Write open letters to Congress QQing that they no longer get to enjoy a 2.3% tax rate while the rest of us donate a third or more to uncle sam.
In my opinion, companies sending jobs overseas (that includes military and reconstruction ventures) are the root cause of the US economy being in the shitter. The housing bubble is just speculation and good marketing managing to hide the ugly truth for a couple years. If you circulate all you money within your own economy, someone still has dollars to spend and the cycle continues. When we send it all overseas, the country piggy bank dries up. I therefore have no pity for companies that claim they won't be able to make it if we levy on them the same taxes every US based company currently operates under. They can adapt, or get the **ck out - there's plenty of other companies that would love to take the market share.
You can get 15 minutes of fame, but you can go down in history for infamy.
If you keep insisting that corporations don't deserve all of their tax breaks and special treatment by the government, the really greedy ones may be put out of business. Then, the network of Fortune 1000 CEOs might make less money, and they might have to actually work, or not even receive hundreds of millions of dollars in bonuses when their businesses are failing.
This may lead to the end of large, bureaucratic, inefficient mega corporations which exploit people and resources for short term profit, using monopoly tactics and sleazy practices like bribing politicians or using tax havens or ripping off their customers. You might end up with unions, four week vacations, the right to health care, and a lower poverty rate!
You fell for it! Bravo, douchebag.
I dispute the premise that maximizing tax revenue is a legitimate function of government.
120 characters isn't enough to explain it.
> Still running scared of the Red Menace, I see.
Yes. Better question is why aren't you? Or did you think the failure of the Soviet Union settled everything? It should have, but Communism is a religion and no number of failures will convince the true believers that their religion is false. Nope, the SOviets failed because they didn't 'do it right.' whatever the hell that means. But at any rate, Communism is still alive (although mutating wildly) in China. Communism is still alive and well in our own hemisphere. And most importantly, Communism is still alive and well here in the USA. And just like Vietnam and Iraq's most important battles were fought in Washington DC's halls of power, the NY media and the academy, the Cold War rages on in the same places and the decisive battle has yet to happen.
> When the controllers of the means of production fail to keep the means of production working properly,
> smart people look to take over the means of production.
Interesting notion. The UAW was the biggest contributor to the failure of the US auto industry. By raising labor costs to the point only huge luxury cars could earn a profit. So now the POTUS has reached into the market and seized two automakers and awarded them to the unions who created the problem but contributed heavily to his campaign. When a union gets majority ownership (and not by buying it, but by seizing it by virtue of political power) of their workplace what other term you you prefer we use to describe it other than "the workers seizing the means of production." Which has been the Communist rallying cry since the perverted notion began.
But we do have a system to deal with the controllers of the means of production failing. It used to be called bankruptcy court. But the UAW would lose bigtime so it wasn't considered a (politically) viable option.
Democrat delenda est
A lot of that answer is depending on who's measuring "better", obviously. But there's a lot of little effects that are hard to measure in reality, even decades after the fact.
The World Wide Web is dying. Soon, we shall have only the Internet.
If the corporations are, for practical purposes, actually located in the United States, then they should pay United States taxes. If they don't, the answer is simple: don't let the corporations do business in the United States.
That way, they can move elsewhere if they want, but they would still be losing their largest market.
What you said is clearly pointed out by most economists in studies on these topics...
BUT, the standard party line of reducing taxes is that "cut taxes to increase revenue".
It is frankly, based on nothing but hot air and/or lies and most serious economic studies have found little to no room for quibbles in that.
Do you know how blocking sections works?
When you do NOT block them, they appear as normal on your main page.
When you do block them, you have to dig into the section to see them.
If you don't have the sections blocked, you'll see no change if the stories are properly categorized.
Boy you are a stupid ass-hat.
While corporations love to move labor operations offshore to save money, to places like India and China (certainly not Madrid), I have a feeling the corporate executives themselves don't really want to live in places like that, as evidenced by the fact that they all live in the USA, where their personal income is taxed far less than in places like Spain, and they don't have to put up with the living conditions of places like India and China (or the culture difference, for that matter).
Because communism is dead, and has been for a long, long time. I am scared of fascism, which is far different from Communism, and I think you need to learn what the difference is. Key aspect: in the Cold War Soviet Union, the workers did not control the means of production. Neither did they in Communist China, nor do they in modern China. In actuality, it is logistically impossible for the workers to control the means of production on a large scale. Hence, I do not fear that.
Yet another falsehood from the right. The Ford Ranger was hugely profitable, despite labor costs. The smaller cars that were produced by Honda and Toyota faced labor costs very close to that of American car companies. Yet they were very profitable -- and the difference in profit was greater than the difference in labor costs. The failures of the auto industry are squarely on the shoulders of those who were unable to foresee and meet the demands of the market. This happened because the automakers in the US grew accustomed to creating and molding the market, and were unable to adapt to quality competition being able to serve the actual demands of the market.
I think you consider the unions a bugaboo. So be it; it helps me understand where you're coming from, and where I'm unlikely to be able to get a point across. The biggest one being that the health of the UAW, in this case, is a bellwether for larger labor concerns. And by labor, I don't mean organized labor, I mean working class. These are the people that ultimately pay if the automakers close their doors. Any sane capital investor loses a small part of their portfolio; any worker entangled loses their entire livelihood for a while.
I understand the philosophy you are coming from (I once believed much the same), but please be aware that the Communism bugaboo was supported by the government largely to keep the domestic populace in check. The external threat is a wonderful tool for those in power...
"Trolls they were, but filled with the evil will of their master: a fell race..." -- J.R.R. Tolkien on Olog-hai
You would rather he go after corporations because you're rabble. Rabble love it when some populist politician "sticks it to the man", and "corporations" are the current boogie man.
The problem is that it doesn't matter if corporations make "billions of dollars". That money goes exactly one place: into a person's hands. That person pays taxes.
Corporate income tax is just another tax on stockholders, employees, and customers but dumb people love it because they think they're getting one over on "rich fat cats". Now tell me, who doesn't fall into one of those categories?
What the fuck, people?
Evading taxes is evading taxes.
All I did was reference a fucking Simpsons quote.
Evade. Avoid. Both are words. Both have meanings. The meanings are extremely similar, and the words are often synonyms.
I don't give a fucking shit about the crime of "tax evasion" vs legal acts to avoid paying taxes.
Regardless of what is a crime and what is legal, evading/avoiding taxes is tax evasion/avoision. It doesn't matter how you do it or whether or not it's legal.
Seeking ways to not pay taxes, or to pay less taxes, can be referred to as evading or avoiding taxes.
FUCK.
Yes, so unlike those non-socialist countries IRELAND and HOLLAND. Sheesh.
"I guess the moral of the story is, don't paint your airship with rocket fuel." -- Addison Bain
I'm just pointing out why I don't think they would actually move their headquarters in reality. No matter how cheap taxes are in India, for instance, no American executive wants to move there. They want to live here (and not just anywhere in the USA, but in expensive places like California, even though much cheaper places like Alabama and Mississippi exist), and enjoy the benefits of using offshore tax havens and moving production offshore.
Right, because he had time to carefully investigate the finances of everyone he nominated. Troll.
Obviously someone had time to investigate. (We found out, after all.) Maybe it's more a competence problem rather than a time problem. Or maybe they just didn't care.
Anyway, what's so hard about filling out a tax form correctly? How much "careful investigation" does it take? Every single adult in the US is expected to do it (and get it right) every year.
They're both equally rooted in statism however. Thus, both philosophies are the antithesis to freedom and liberty.
You should be scared by both communism AND fascism. I'll even throw in theocracies as well. They are all statist regimes.
Life is not for the lazy.
One of the three was hoping for the tax liability to expire beyond the normal collection point.
Sorry, but there are so called elite of the crop and if they can't do their taxes right it either means...
a) the tax code is too convoluted for even experts
b) they are dishonest
c) all of the above.
I guess we can thank Obama for at least identifying scoundrels in his Administration, the problem is he still allowed them in. Congress gave them a pass which isn't saying much for that group either.
I welcome the IRS to check my numbers. I know I am honest. I also know that it is right. You have to figure that not only do these guys know better but many probably had help filing. It doesn't wash.
I would love the IRS to be required to go over in detail ALL members of Congress EACH YEAR. They should be subject to the utmost scrutiny at all times. However just like Presidents too many adopt an elitist "nobility" attitude that they are too good to be closely examined. After all, it is they who protect us and therefor deserve the latitude.
* Winners compare their achievements to their goals, losers compare theirs to that of others.
Do they have to be US owned?
What does that question even mean? You want to track down all the billions of shares, find who they're registered to (pension schemes, investment funds, other companies, lots and lots of individuals with tiny holdings) track down where they are or more to the point who owns those assets (more and more companies with more and more minority individuals, scattered across the world...). There isn't an end to the paper chase. At least, not one you'll ever reach. Not because of any nefarious dealings but just the reality of international trade and the way corporations are designed. There's no answer to e.g. "is IBM American owned" beyond "IBM's ownership is diverse". That's before you even concern yourself with nominee ownership.
spun suggested that you look at the linked-to studies on the Wikipedia page. This is not the same as looking at the Wikipedia page. As an aside, you're a loon and I submit that the only reason you've been modded up in this thread is your UID.
Taxes on business is retarded. I know everyone wants to stick it to big business, but it makes no sense. When companies make money, the company either: is used to pay off expenses, including employees (who pay income tax) rent, etc (who pay property tax) or buying shit (and paying sales tax). Or they reinvest it (which hopefully leads to bigger income in the future) or they pay it out as some sort of dividend or stock buy (in which case those who benefit will be taxed with income/capital gains tax). Taxing the businesses profit amounts to double-dipping. The result of which is businesses now must compete with their competitors in not just the quality marketing, and price of their products, but also in how good they are at evading taxes. A company who manipulates its balance sheet to minimize tax liability has a competitive advantage against one who doesn't.
the result is ploys like being "headquartered" in a tax haven, and balance sheets that have been manipulated to hide as much information on their actual assets as possible. They further avoid taxes by buying influence over politicians to get tax rebates and incentives and other such bribes.
The result is, companies still manage to pay little to no taxes, the balance sheet manipulation makes accurate assessment of businesses impossible for investors and regulators, and competition is stifled because established businesses have the politicians bought and paid for, making sure any upstarts don't get the same rebates and preferential treatment they got.
The only people actually paying business taxes are small businesses, who cannot afford a team of lawyers, "creative" accountants, and massive campaign donations to minimize their tax liability. These are the exact same businesses who politicians claim to support.
Everyone knows when it comes to taxes the game is rigged. If a country cracks down on tax evasion there will be another one right behind it looking to claim all the jobs and economic stimulus that business creates. Obama's crackdown will probably lead to a net loss of tax revenue, and cost a lot of people their jobs.
> Obama isn't a fool. He knows what the consequences will be.
There is much merit in what you say but I still hold out to one hope. Overreach. Because Obama is fool and almost zero experience he might not listen to wiser heads in his Party (and I'm not talking about the Democrats). Remember that with Specter's coming out Democrats own Washington. Yes the Joker's eventual arrival (if that ain't the Universe having a bit of fun with us what is!) their rule will be total, but with Snowe and/or Collins available to 'be bipartisan' when needed they already have effective control. And come the next elections if the economy is still in the crapper Obama just might be Carter 2.0. Assuming the Republicans can find A) find a leader and B) nominate him/her instead of passing them over for another McCain/Dole/loser.
I think we both agree that barring Obama having an epiphany and suddenly becoming a centrist free market guy the economy ain't getting better. So it is only a question of how bad it gets and will there be enough MSM types still working at places still in business to blow a smokescreen for his sorry ass to hide behind.
Democrat delenda est
I know those people, too. However I don't think, opinions of former Nazi collaborators and CIA-funded saboteurs count for much.
After moving to US I occasionally try to imagine what kind of person I would become if I was born here instead of USSR, and raised by your society. Those are the most terrifying thoughts I ever had.
Contrary to the popular belief, there indeed is no God.
3. Anyone who can earn the endorsement of multiple known Communists (Ayers, Wright, Soros, etc) is almost certainly a Communist. It's just how they roll. And beginning one's political career with a fundraiser thrown in the home of a admitted violent revolutionary Communist is designed to send a signal to other fellow travellers. Add in the other factors and it would be foolish to extend Mr. Obama the benefit of the doubt.
You're an idiot.
So, by your logic, since Republicans are endorsed by several KKK grand dragons, they must all be racists?
Throwing poo at a politician to see what sticks is a lousy way of having an argument. If you don't like the idea of people who earn more paying a larger proportion of their social duty to support the common infrastructure, go dress up like an idiot and go to a tea party, or better yet, go to another country which better suits your ideology. No one's begging you to stay.
But... they won't want.
They won't move for reasons I haven't seen mentioned yet. They tend to like things like reliable infrastructures, relatively fair legal systems, etc. And the most important thing of all - the protection of the United States and its military. When country X decides to nationalize their factories and imprison their executives, I'm guessing that knowing the Cayman Islands stands ready to retaliate will be small comfort.
Sorry, I forgot and didn't get around to replying to the rest of your post.....
> I think you consider the unions a bugaboo.
Yup. But only under certain conditions. The rise of organized labor was a reaction to real problems, too bad it happened right in time to be almost totally captured by International Communism with organized crime picking up the scraps.
My major objection comes when the government gets involved and grants the union a monopoly on labor once a site votes in the union. Can't see how that isn't an uncompensated taking. Reducing management's decision to pay up or close the worksite seems unfair. Yes workers have the right to all walk out of a job they think is treating them unfairly. But management should have the right to let em go if they think the expense of recruiting and training a whole new labor force is less expensive than the union's demands. Yes management might be wrong in that calculation. But the union could also have been wrong in evaluating the worth of it's labor. Both sides should have the right to be wrong because it is the most basic liberty all others depend upon.
And yes, while I think the UAW with their insane work rules, gold plated pensions and such were major contributing factors management stupidity should not be ignored. Which is why they should have been allowed to go bankrupt and let the assets be bought up by people who would hopefully put those assets to more productive uses. Thus both labor, management and the shareholders would have lost and the important economic signal that would have sent would have been a good thing.
> The smaller cars that were produced by Honda and Toyota faced labor costs very close to that of American car companies.
That is simply wrong. Show me one auto bearing a foreign name badge built in a union state at union wages? Yes those folks working in the southern US make pretty good wages but it often less than half of the total compensation the unionized plants pay. Remember that the final blow to Detroit was the accumulated pensions owned to the unions on the automakers balance sheets.
Democrat delenda est
Well, if you're moderately well off, you can farm out your taxes to a tax accountant who is more familiar with tax law, leaving you to pursue what you're really good at. Division of labour in the fine industrial tradition. However sometimes those accountants get excessively creative in finding "loopholes" that don't exist because by doing so they can claim to have saved you lots of money and ensure your continued use of their services. At least, until you get audited. Sometimes that creativity is knowingly encouraged by the customer, and sometimes it's the accountant that takes advantage of a clueless customer.
For instance, I know of a small business owner who owed thousands of dollars in sales taxes because the accountant had failed to account for them properly and pay them. Had the accountant properly reported the business' profit position, including the sales tax, the business owner would have closed up shop earlier, losing the accountant his job. Proving intent on the part of the accountant in a court of law would have been too iffy to make it worth risking additional money on lawyers, so the business owner was on the hook for the unpaid taxes.
It's like any of those "if it seems too good to be true, it probably isn't true" deals, but it's hard for people to know if it really is too good to be true, or else they wouldn't have hired a (tax) accountant for their expertise.
Laissez lire, et laissez danser; ces deux amusements ne feront jamais de mal au monde. - Voltaire
After looking at my girlfriends taxes who got divorced during early 2008, bought a house, has itemized business expenses and has an extra property, I thought "no freaking way i'm doing those taxes". I tried to figure out eligibility for extra child tax credits but we gave up and ended up giving it to a tax accountant.
If anything can be gleamed from this very long thread, it should be that taxes overall are too fucking complicated. Everyone thinks they should get a handout and politicians were more than happy to oblige, giving us this conglomerate of shit we call the IRS code.
You can't legislate goodness. Let each to his own destiny, by will of his freely made choices.
What's your definition of "high"? If you say 35% is high, then there's a massive difference between the two.
MABASPLOOM!
I always wondered if I'd change my tune when I entered the top tax brackets. It hasn't. As i make more money I recognize that i have the ability not only to pay more than people who make much less but i can also afford a greater percentage.
Why? It is really really easy. My basic needs are taken care of with about 1/5th of my salary. What I choose to indulge in beyond that is, of course, due to my own labor but it is also due to the labors of others and the society as a whole.
So not only can i afford to pay more--I should pay more and at a greater rate. To me that is the clearly moral stance and the only one that makes sense. I could have a whole different argument about WHAT the government should spend money on but not that i should pay proportionally more to fund it than a kid making 15K a year. Is there a rate that is TOO high? Of course there is but i think going back to the rates that existed under Clinton will be fine.
Well, if the goal is to get more businesses to come to the US, and build and create jobs, why don't we go the complete opposite. How about almost no, or VERY little corporate taxes, with breaks and incentives to employ US citizens.
That would bring in companies in droves to the US.
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
The tax rate at the time of the American Revolution has been estimated to be well under 10% on average. Sales and import taxes were just about the ONLY form of tax at the time.
Remember the motto "No taxation without representation!"?? That is what the revolution was largely over.
I do not get enough representation by government to justify their taking of what amounts today to probably 50% or more, when all is said and done. (Sales taxes, excise taxes, Social Security, income taxes, etc. -- and don't try to tell me that Social Security is not a tax. Even the government calls it that.)
What the HELL does paying taxes have to do with morality?!?!
Are you saying the US was immoral before we had an income tax? Before employment taxes were immoral?
I see nothing moral or immoral about funding the govt to do its duty...which if you went by constitutional manadate, is one HELL of a lot less than they are doing now.
But, it has nothing to do with morality.
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
> In a nation that can afford to have multiple multi-billion, there is NO EXCUSE for anyone lacking basic food, shelter, and clothing.
I'd agree with that notion. In a country with this much opportunity there is NO EXCUSE for some idiot to waste their lives in squalor.
Ok, more seriously, you have a point. But lets examine our differing proposals to help lift up the poor. I will assume from your writing, that you are a standard issue Social Democrat/Liberal/Progressive who believes in the progressive income tax, income redistribution and the entitlement based welfare state as the means to solve poverty. And your side has been working hard at it since the New Deal, then the Great Society, the War on Poverty and so on. Just when are we skeptics entitled to ask for an accounting for your efforts? Because any fool can see that it ain't working yet and appears to be making most of our societal problems worse. But it does make liberals feel better about themselves, proving how they are so enlightened and care so much more than the poor selfish conservatives.
Then we have my team's proposed solution. We assert that the State, being built on force, can't do charity and that when it tries it causes more problems than it solves; it creates dependency and a sense of entitlement and that history has borne out these beliefs. That private charity has none of those defects and history has proven it to be effective and that furthermore if government could be scaled back private charity could and would step in and do a far more effective job.
Government charity always fails because it is flawed from the start. When the government takes the product of your labor and gives it to someone it deems more in need of it, the government pinhead gains zero Karma for gifting someone else's resources, seeing as it required no sacrifice on his part. You had no choice in the decision so you gain zero Karma. The recepient quickly gets the notion that it as his birthright to be a ward of the state and thus does not see a need to improve, and thus gains zero Karma. When you give to charity (or better directly help someone in your community in need) you DO gain Karma. And people accepting charity usually understand it isn't going to keep coming forever and thus has incentive to make the most of the offers of assistance beyond just immediate cash, thus becoming a self supporting member of the community and thereby gaining Karma.
And then we get the more fundamental problems in your philosophy. Liberalism is based on the notion that the average citizen is too much of a cold bastard to help his fellow man, so you more enlightened sorts must step in and force everyone to do it. Of course if everyone really WERE the bastards you thing we are Democrats would only be able to get elected by becoming lying bastards to fool the cold bastards into voting for em.... at least until you could get 50% of the population addicted to government handouts. So doesn't that mean that your philosophy is based on destroying rule By The People and replacing it with Rule by an Enlightened Elite? And that leads to the bigger question, if average humanity is really the scum you guys believe why are ya so hellbent on 'taking care' of us? Are we just pets or something? Oh sorry, isn't that pretty much the story of the Democrat party in the 20th Century?
So I guess the question I'd put to you is which is more important to you, clinging to failed theories or helping the poor. Dare to BELIEVE in your fellow man.
Democrat delenda est
If you're an American abroad, you're taxed for having a US passport (a reason why I have heard quite a few peopel changing nationality). All Obama is doing is making this a "feature" of being a US company as well (OK, a bit simplified but this is what it appears to boil down to).
Joking aside, it's not an easy problem to solve. If you look at what profits MS has made over the years and how much tax it has paid you do start to ask questions. And it's not just MS.
You phrase "taxs world income" also is correct in another way. Current US external debt appears to exceed the value of the bailouts. In other words, you could say that the world (again) pays to fix the US..
Here is the problem with your contrived statement. And yes, It's almost identical to one made by Warren Buffet a few years back and parroted by a couple of people who are now known to be tax cheats (as if raising the taxes would effect someone cheating and not paying).
Anyways, here is the problem. You keep using the word I. In everything you say, it's all about you. So why are you trying to impose this idea of yours into others? If you don't pay enough taxes and that's your honest believe (Mr. Kennedy who failed to report stock transactions that he actually reported to the senate ethics comity and Reinold who failed to report rental income for more then 10 years and both have parroted the same statement to some extent) there is a process where you can donate more then what your allowed. In fact, everyone who claimed they can or should pay more taxes fail to pay more then they have to and most of them have structured their income to the point that most of their tax obligation is negated or they just cheat and don't report the income.
So why is that, you and many others want to tag onto this line about needing to pay more but when the ability is and always has been there, you fail to do so. And when you and others do your taxes, why is it that you always attempt to take as many deductions as possible? Your entire statement was about how you feel, and how you do whatever but it's nothing more then lip service. You posted AC so no one who knows you will chime in with the truth of you making 35k a year with a wife and 2 kids and don't even pay a 10% effective tax rate.
Man that pisses me off. The whole 'dependent' thing.
The whole point is that it's an *entitlement*. I'm not asking anyone for a handout and praying they're in a good mood in my time of need. It's OWED to me. As in MINE. That's the important part. That I don't have to ASK.
As someone that came out of foster care with no relatives I know first hand what it's like to have _no_ safety net. And I've been laid off a few times, in fairly quick succession. That means I know what it's like to sleep outside, or in the back of a car.
I pay taxes on every penny I make. If an hour of my labor is worth $20 and I trade that hour for $20 I pay as if I had gained $20 _income_ and not merely broken even. Why do I have to pay? The New Deal, that's why.
The New Deal and the safety net it promised is what made it possible for the government to put that tax liability on my head. And now that it's on and fixed good, the people that used to foot 80% of the bill is now only covering 20% wants to take away that safety net -because if I wasn't lazy I wouldn't need one. That 20% is just too damn much now.
Let me tell you something. When my employer goes belly up or lays me off (to get a momentary jump in stock price so some fat cat can line his pockets) and I need help, I'm not going to any 'faith based charity' or some shit like that. I'm going to get my 'entitlement'. You know why?
Because I'm ENTITLED GOD DAMN IT. I'm sick and tired of carving out 30+% of my wages to subsidize a laundry list of corporate interests in this country, only to listen to the bastards rant on about how if I have any kind of a guarantee it'll just make me DEPENDANT. WTF. You don't know me. I once pulled a 60 hour shift and spent 25 of those hours at hard labor. Call me lazy to my face and I'll take your fucking teeth out.
Redistribution of wealth? That's my motherfucking MONEY going to subsidize the corporate fat cats pocketing BILLIONS Look it up. Get a map of 'giver' states and 'taker' states and overlay it with a political Dems vs Rep map. Holy Shit?! Welfare is what I call it.
There's a line that people just flat out shouldn't be _allowed_ to fall through. Not talking about living high, but I am talking about food, dry clothes, place to sleep *when it's needed* and ffs the knowledge that I can see a doctor when I'm sick. What you don't seem to realize is that when people have to fight day and night for those minimum needs, they feel relieved and emotionally 'take a breath' during the times when they have them. Having those things guaranteed frees people to look up, to start thinking about personal _achievements_ and not mere survival. Knowing I don't need to go to my neighbors or to some charity on my knees for a 'handout' in a crisis means dignity and respect. I earned that. If you think I'm being unreasonable or greedy, fine. Gimme my money back then.
If grubby hands are gonna be in my pocket every Friday there needs to be some RECIPROCITY.
Samsung took back my unlocked bootloader because Google wants me to rent movies. They're both evil.
Well "gee" who knew that there's hundreds of thousands of American employees working, eating and living in the cayman islands.
Must be getting crowded with 18000+ US corps multiplied by hundreds of employees each.
Or not.
Kinda the point of the article...they *don't* live there. The corp shifts its paperwork out of the nice cushy western country where all the executive live to some pathetic third world country, but still maintains 100% of its physical presence *in* the nice cushy western country. If your business is 100% physically in the country, hiding behind the government, using the infrastructure and courts and mooching off the public resources that allow you to operate that have been paid for by OTHER MORE UPSTANDING BUSINESSES without paying your share for all those things then your a parasite and deserve everything you get from people who pay their share!
They're nothing but parasites and not long ago such unpatriotic behavior was scorned publicly by both sides of the aisle.
Now the western world has the lick-spittle, power worshipers who enable them...
How is it we've totally forgotten that? Everything I see gov't doing now is about "maximizing revenue", as if we're all cows to be milked rather than citizens.
Maybe if they didn't maximize spending, they wouldn't need so much revenue, ya think??
~REZ~ #43301. Who'd fake being me anyway?
While I'd actually be in favor of that outcome, I don't think it would necessarily happen. Corporations don't actually pay taxes...they just pass the cost onto the consumer.
If they cut the corporate taxes...they come in, create more business, and employ more people who then pay more taxes, and govt. gets more revenue. More growth means more revenue, even from less tax venues...
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
The Cayman Islands is hardly a third-world country. It's a British overseas territory: "According to the CIA World Factbook, the Cayman Islands GDP per capita is the 12th highest in the world."
Britain has a lot of overseas territory tax havens, some a long way from Britain (Cayman Islands, Bermuda, etc) and some surrounding it (Isle of Man, Jersey, Guernsey). There are well-paying jobs on all of them supporting the off-shore HQ industry -- the Caribbean is a nice place to live, and if you don't mind not being in a large city, Jersey etc are too (it's not very far to fly to London or Paris).
Really wish I could mod you up. The US isn't alone in this kind of crap. Experts in any field that is slightly complex or has a grey area will lie outright or just guess if in doubt on occasion in order to stay in business.
I don't think you understand the ability of a political partisan to make excuses for the failings of the home team while condemning the opposition for doing the exact same thing......
I want peace on earth and goodwill toward man.
We are the United States Government! We don't do that sort of thing.
Thank you. Well said.
I had a bit of an epiphany back in the 80's. A right-winger co-worker was ranting about "wealth redistribution" right as the savings and loan scandal was happening, and Resolution Trust was being set up to clean up the mess. The likes of Neal Bush, et al got away scott-free, and my tax dollars were backfilling the people who had gotten scammed. So effectively my tax dollars were "redistributed" to the scammers. Then go read a little on the good old "military-industrial complex" which dominates the DOD budget and the current banking bailout, and realize that there is and has been a heck of a lot of "uphill wealth redistribution" going on.
When I see pleas for the poor, I keep hearing about how much can be done with so little, and I don't begrudge it. The pleas of the wealthy are far more expensive.
The living have better things to do than to continue hating the dead.
The whole point is that it's an *entitlement*. I'm not asking anyone for a handout and praying they're in a good mood in my time of need. It's OWED to me. As in MINE. That's the important part. That I don't have to ASK. [...]
I pay taxes on every penny I make. If an hour of my labor is worth $20 and I trade that hour for $20 I pay as if I had gained $20 _income_ and not merely broken even. Why do I have to pay? The New Deal, that's why.
People who are against welfare aren't talking about people like you. Very few people want a complete absence of a safety net. Unemployment assistance, temporary housing assistance, education assistance, food stamps, whatever. That stuff costs hardly anything anyway.
Get a map of 'giver' states and 'taker' states and overlay it with a political Dems vs Rep map. Holy Shit?! Welfare is what I call it.
Those maps seem a little misleading to me. It counts overall federal spending, not welfare. North Carolina has several large military bases which run off of federal spending. Is that welfare? Also note how the colors are tied more to population density than anything else. Somehow interstate highways connecting California to the East cost are considered welfare for the states in between.
The other thing is it doesn't break it down further than the state level. California is a "giver" state, but what if you break it down to a city or county level? I've heard that the rural areas of California are very wealthy and tend to vote Republican (if you've seen the county voting map of the country rather than the state-level map, you know what I'm talking about). Maybe they make California a net giver? I don't know, I just feel like things are kept deliberately misleading to help a certain agenda.
I'm sick and tired of carving out 30+% of my wages to subsidize a laundry list of corporate interests in this country, only to listen to the bastards rant on about how if I have any kind of a guarantee it'll just make me DEPENDANT.
Out of curiosity, do you have any figures for how much money goes to corporate interests? Do you do stuff like count 100% of military spending as a corporate subsidy since the military protects them? (I've seen that plenty of times, particularly in the "true cost" of oil.) What's certain is that if you're paying a 30% tax rate overall, then over 1/3 of your taxes are going to Social Security. I'd be surprised if corporate interests get a similar share.
Where can we find a list of the 200 companies that oppose this plan?
Dude, where's my packet?
First of all, I don't think "contrived" means what you think it means. Saying that rich people should pay more taxes than poor people is a valid opinion, just one you don't seem to agree with.
Next, why bother bringing up a couple of people who claimed to believe similarly to the AC but didn't? Would you say murder is okay because until they got caught the Boston Strangler and John Wayne Gacy said murder was wrong? The philosophy isn't tainted just because someone tried to use it as camouflage for their activities.
That's just silly. You can support higher taxes without taking it upon yourself to simply pay more than is required. One person paying a few thousand extra is not going to make a difference in the grand scheme of things. It just doesn't scale that way. The AC would be an idiot to simply pay more while nobody else does. As far as the AC "imposing" his view on others, he's not. He's sharing his view. If enough people agree with that view, it gets adopted as a general rule for everyone. This is part of living in a society. If that system doesn't work for you, I would suggest you may like Somalia. They don't have one of those evil government things there, they all get to do whatever they like. Personally, I don't think that sounds all that great, but that's just me.
Citation needed. Good luck being able to prove "everyone", or even "most" do this. Some do, some don't.
What's wrong with legitimate deductions? They exist for a reason. Again, you can support a higher tax rate while taking deductions without a conflict. Abuse of deductions are an entirely different story, but since you have no proof that the AC has done this, it's irrelevant. By the way, someone with a very high income can take quite a few deductions and still pay more in taxes than the average person makes in a year. This isn't an either-or issue.
Or he's a middle-manager making a low six-figures, or Warren Buffet, or even Jimmy Buffet. Even if he did post under his regular name, it probably wouldn't have made a difference. I have no idea what you make, even though you didn't post AC.
Some bring out the best in others, some the worst. Some bring out far more.
If you need a software program to do taxes, it's too complicated.
As of right now this story has well over 1000 comments and is the most popular story on the front page.
Someone thought this story was interesting/important enough to put on the front page and, lo and behold, it looks like they're right.
Don't hate because online disagreements make you squeamish.
That's why I (as a very conservative Republican) want EVERYONE in senate and congress, and all their staff, to be audited by the IRS yearly. I think that anyone who knowingly cheated on their taxes should be removed from their position, with a special election being held to replace them. I would leave the Democrats to deal with their party as they wish (after they are removed from their position), but I should hope that the Republicans would kick the tax cheats out of the party. I want my party to clean up any of their own problems first, then we could have the right to scrutinize the problems of other parties. But that's just my opinion.
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