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Microsoft Pushes For Public Education Funding While Avoiding State Taxes

Posted by Soulskill on from the cognitive-dissonance-provides-shareholder-value dept.

theodp writes: After stressing how important the funding of Washington State education — particularly CS Ed — is to Microsoft, company general counsel Brad Smith encountered one of those awkward interview moments (audio at 28:25). GeekWire Radio: "So, would you ever consider ending that practice [ducking WA taxes by routing software licensing royalties through Nevada-based Microsoft Licensing, GP] in Nevada [to help improve WA education]?" Smith: "I think there are better ways for us to address the state's needs than that kind of step." Back in 2010, Smith, Steve Ballmer, and Microsoft Corporation joined forces to defeat Proposition I-1098, apparently deciding there were better ways to address the state's needs than a progressive income tax.

7 of 173 comments (clear)

  1. Everyone loves taxes by srichard25 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Everyone loves taxes when it is someone else paying them.

    1. Re:Everyone loves taxes by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Everyone loves taxes when it is someone else paying them.

      I love taxes even when I'm paying them. What I don't love is people who want the benefits of public services and infrastructure (i.e. civilization) but don't want to pay for it.

    2. Re: Everyone loves taxes by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Federal waste is a problem. Education funding is not part of that problem. In Washington State, two thirds of school funding comes from the state, and the tax Microsoft is ducking is state revenue. The Feds and bridges to nowhere have nothing to do with this, but MS is refusing to pay its share of the cost for services that it is demanding from the state. It would be one thing if they were using tax loopholes to avoid paying for something irrelevant to them, but the fact that they have their fingers in the pie and don't want to pay for it is as reprehensible as it gets.

    3. Re:Everyone loves taxes by garyisabusyguy · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Sure, sure it is popular to claim that the government wastes money

      It goes back to the Proxmire Golden Fleece Awards where a Senator from Wisconsin would claim to have identified horrendous wastes of money, while the state that he represented (Wisconsin) raked in billions of dollars in milk and cheese subsidies.

      Between that and claims of 'Welfare Queens', the political right has played a distraction game to subvert programs like education while lining their pockets with money going to defense contractors and industries in their own backyards

      FWIW, education is not a waste, neither are any number of programs that make for a healthier, smarter and more capable workforce. Companies like MS claim that they cannot find the 'right' resources here and that they have to bring in workers from overseas, while they simultaneously subvert the American worker by shortchanging us all when they find ways to avoid paying their taxes

      Americans who are not billionaires or corporations need to stop buying into the BS propaganda and start demanding that companies pay their fair share

      --
      Wherever You Go, There You Are
  2. Alternatively by wombatmobile · · Score: 5, Informative

    “In Venezuela Chavez has made the co-ops a top political priority, giving them first refusal on government contracts and offering them economic incentives to trade with one another. By 2006, there were roughly 100,000 co-operatives in the country, employing more than 700,000 workers. Many are pieces of state infrastructure – toll booths, highway maintenance, health clinics – handed over to the communities to run. It’s a reverse of the logic of government outsourcing – rather than auctioning off pieces of the state to large corporations and losing democratic control, the people who use the resources are given the power to manage them, creating, at least in theory, both jobs and more responsive public services. Chavez’s many critics have derided these initiatives as handouts and unfair subsidies, of course. Yet in an era when Halliburton treats the U.S. government as its personal ATM for six years, withdraws upward of $20 billion in Iraq contracts alone, refuses to hire local workers either on the Gulf coast or in Iraq, then expresses its gratitude to U.S. taxpayers by moving its corporate headquarters to Dubai (with all the attendant tax and legal benefits), Chavez’s direct subsidies to regular people look significantly less radical.”

    Naomi Klein

    1. Re:Alternatively by jcr · · Score: 5, Informative

      Has anyone told Naomi Klein that the Chavistas have reached the end stage of socialism already? They're out of toilet paper, just like the Soviets.

      -jcr

      --
      The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
  3. As opposed to.... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Google pushesf for Public Education Funding While Avoiding Taxes

    Apple pushes for Public Education Funding While Avoiding Taxes

    Goldman Sachs pushes For Public Education Funding While Avoiding Taxes

    ExxonMobil pushes For Public Education Funding While Avoiding Taxes

    Koch Brothers pushes For Public Education Funding While Avoiding Taxes.

    etc...

    I'm all for capitalism but American capitalism was never about Rand's definition. It was about working hard and smart and being rewarded appropriately for your effort. It was OK to be rich as long as you earned it. What's currently going on though is a return to aristocracy rather than meritocracy.

    People that richly benefited from our mixed economy are now going on to screw the rest of us because they are in a decision making role. Back in the 50s major CEOs made 50 times what an employee made. Today they are making 500 times. We even have companies like Warlmart that shamelessly depend on food stamps to subside their employees wages. At some point there is going to be major blow back if major corporation continue hoarding all the wealth by evading taxes and paying their employees crap. (as happened to Greece where their own government and elite screwed over their own countrymen)