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For Microsoft, $93B Abroad Means Avoiding $30B Tax Hit
walterbyrd (182728) writes "Microsoft Corp. is currently sitting on almost $29.6 billion it would owe in U.S. taxes if it repatriated the $92.9 billion of earnings it is keeping offshore, according to disclosures in the company's most recent annual filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The amount of money that Microsoft is keeping offshore represents a significant spike from prior years, and the levies the company would owe amount to almost the entire two-year operating budget of the company's home state of Washington."
The summary, of course, missed Microsoft's legitimate response to people's enquiries:
The company says it has "not provided deferred U.S. income taxes" because it says the earnings were generated from its "non-U.S. subsidiaries” and then "reinvested outside the U.S.”
It's almost like the editors wanted to publish a biased article or something. Scandalous.
Because most, if not all, of the big companies use various means to offshore money that should have US taxes paid on them oversea so they can avoid it.
Apparently Microsoft is no exception to that, nor even all that exceptional if that's all they've "shielded" from US taxation.
because they don't pay tax on it there either.
But shouldn't that be up to the foreign countries where the money is earned? If a country doesn't want to tax earnings in its borders, that's their business. It doesn't mean the US or any other country should have a claim on it.
If I can be modded down for being a troll, can I be modded up for being an orc, or a balrog?
Freedom of speech isn't freedom from consequences of your speech, sweet cheeks. He's free to associate with a disgusting ideology that holds certain people inferior because of how they're born, I'm free to mock him for it. For that matter, I'm free to mock your ignorance.
Hail Eris, full of mischief...
E pluribus sanguinem
Go on, attack and mock those who you don't agree with. Attack me all you want. It just shows your intolerance. Not that those who agree with you care that you are all intolerant. Intolerance is now the greatest virtue of the liberal mind, as long as it is in support of liberal ideology.
It's amazing, isn't it, just how many conservative victims are on /. these days. Bonus points for whining about someone not tolerating your intolerance, and for whining about it in an intolerant way.
And here I thought conservative ideology was that we should man up and not worry about hurt feelings or political correctness. Shows what I know.
Hail Eris, full of mischief...
E pluribus sanguinem
The 1% pushing the tax burden off on the 99%, who can't play international games with their finances.
No, that's not relevant. They play a shell game to make sure that all earned profits are earned in areas with little to no tax, then claim they made no profits. Or, if you're GE, you claim you made a $1B loss while reporting billions in profits to your shareholders.
Like what, pledging fealty to corporations and letting the people of the country subsidize their existence?
Which helps local municipalities only - ignoring that sales taxes are regressive.
Indeed, they claim the tax credits and losses in the US, but the profits outside. It's a massive scam, really.