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'How About Paying Your Taxes?': Walmart Responds To Amazon's Challenge Over Pay (nbcnews.com)
Amazon and Walmart are in war over worker pay -- and now corporate taxes. After Amazon Chief Executive Officer Jeff Bezos on Thursday issued a challenge to other retailers, not naming which ones specifically, to match Amazon's pay and benefits, Walmart snapped right back. From a report: "Today I challenge our top retail competitors (you know who you are!) to match our employee benefits and our $15 minimum wage. Do it! Better yet, go to $16 and throw the gauntlet back at us. It's a kind of competition that will benefit everyone," Bezos wrote in his annual letter to shareholders. "Hey retail competitors out there (you know who you are) how about paying your taxes?" tweeted Walmart's Executive Vice President of Corporate Affairs Dan Bartlett on Thursday morning, sharing an article about Amazon paying $0 in federal taxes on more than $11 billion in profits last year.
Go Walmart! Can't believe they're on higher ground...
Isn't it funny how corporate America is joking with each other about how they screw the American people. What a great country that they feel free to do this publicly!
When it comes to the benefit of the economy ( local and federal ), isn't worker wage a better way to spend that money?
Mod me down with all of your hatred and your journey towards the dark side will be complete!
wait why do I need to shit on a fan again, why does one lead to the other?
You know how companies declare their profit in their investor meetings? That's a public declaration.
Tax based on that. Or whatever they fill in their tax forms - whichever is greater. No having your cake and eating it too - no more Hollywood accounting and still claiming record income.
Ryan Fenton
The fact that they apparently properly owe $0 in taxes despite $11b in profits might be a failing in the taxation system, but it doesn't mean they aren't paying what they are legally required to. They are clearly using loopholes and the like to dodge what would otherwise be a considerable tax bill, but just because they are doing that does not mean it is actually illegal.
Instead of appealing to Amazon to pay their taxes, they should instead be appealing to Washington to get the taxation laws changed so that this sort of thing can't continue happen.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
How about contributing to society by both paying your employees decent wages AND participating in the social compact by paying taxes instead of say, using the most ruthless and unethical practices to increase the $-peen of your ruling class?
Usually the only number investors care about is EBITDA, which is earnings before taxes, adjustments, amortizations, etc... It's, basically, how much the company made minus operating expenses, because all the other stuff can be used to fudge the numbers.
My Other Computer Is A Data General Nova III.
Better to pay wages than pay taxes.
How about paying your employees enough so they don't have to go on public assistance to survive?
Pot, kettle, black as the souls of their corporate boards...
"But Walmart has said its average worker earns $17.55 an hour with wages and benefits."
From the people I know that work at Walmart, I suspect their "average worker" statement has to include management and executives because the people on the floor and running the cashier, and stocking, and cart collectors, etc, definitely do not reach $17.55, much less have that as an "average" pay.
Absolutely not whatsboutism. I think the point here is that Walmart can't pay higher wages and compete with a company that doesn't have to pay taxes.
Amazon shareholders pay taxes on their investment gains when they cash out. What is the problem?
Not every job is meant for an adult to try to support a household from....
Nope. If you work a job full time then you deserve to be able to live off of it. Anything else is slavery.
What's the mystery?!?!? Amazon has a YUGE loss carryforward from their years of unprofitability -- remember all those years they lost money and stayed afloat from venture capital and then their IPO? Once they eat all that up [and it's close I think] they'll be paying taxes. And paying at a new lower yet competitive rate (worldwide) thanks to DT's tax reform.
Regardless of who has 'the high ground' in this pissing match, it's clear Bezos is being snarky, probably without realizing his own hypocrisy here.
Like how he threaten to move jobs out of Seattle because the local council wanted to add a head tax to fund housing, etc. and then made himself look noble by promising to donate several $million, if not more, to charities to help out with poverty and housing.... which, oh by the way, would net him a nice charitable tax deduction too - double win for him: no new head tax, and gets to claim a charitable deduction!
AC comments get piped to
I'll let F.D.R., the president who signed the first federal minimum wage bill into law comment:
“No business which depends for existence on paying less than living wages to its workers has any right to continue in this country.” (1933, Statement on National Industrial Recovery Act)
Minimum-wage jobs are vital to the smooth functioning of our society, we can't just eliminate them - which is what would happen if all the current employees somehow managed to get better jobs. The average age of minimum wage employees is 30, it's not a bunch of high school kids making spending money after school.
If you really want high school kids to be employable at lower wages - put a lower minimum wage for minors into the law, while requiring a living wage for everyone else. See how long it takes before the kids realize they're being cheated and walk out when the adult working next to them is getting twice the pay for the exact same work.
--- Most topics have many sides worth arguing, allow me to take one opposite you.
That tweet rings a little hollow seeing as Walmart are the undisputed kings of "legal" tax evasion. Walmart frequently pitts communities against each other with the promise of jobs to whittle down their local taxes to zero (just like Amazon)...only to close up shop and move to the next town over when their 10 year tax break ends. Where is the Trump tweet congratulating Amazon on not paying any taxes? They must be "very smart, went to the best schools...you know, like very, very smart...good genes...very successful businessman."
It's illegal and hundreds of thousands of people have lost their jobs to the collapse of so many retailers at Amazon's predatory price dumping practices.
Amazon has destroyed more jobs than created. Of course they can pay $15 an hour today -- they're building robots to unemploy those people as fast as possible.
I don't understand laborers taking jobs for Amazon on anymore than a temporary emergency subsistence basis. Work for a shitty company that is trying to automate their way out of employing you (e.g. Uber as well). That doesn't make any sense.
or is the bloom coming off the rose for Amazon? Remember when they were this cute little outfit that just sold books? Now they are just another huge money grubbing multi-national. Bezos, if it is not completely obvious by now, is a complete and utter prick. Sometimes Amazon makes Microsoft look like choir boys in comparison.
Does anyone here honestly believe Walmart doesn't minimize their tax burden?
"Go Walmart! Can't believe they're on higher ground..."
They are? Amazon is playing by the rules in regards to what taxes they pay just like every single other company I've ever heard of. Otherwise the IRS would be after them big time. The problem with Amazon not paying taxes isn't Amazon, it's our broken tax system.
Meanwhile, for the type of unskilled labor both Walmart and Amazon employ a lot of people for, a $15 minimum wage and decent benefits is extremely generous in the context of what you often see in this sector of our economy. All Walmart does is give their employees a stack of pamphlets explaining how to take advantage of federal and state welfare programs because they know their employees need them.
To put it differently, sure, you can say that Walmart is just playing by the minimum wage rules but they also probably pay as little in taxes as they possibly can as well.
I ignore Anonymous Coward posts. If you want to discuss something, that's awesome. Log in.
That is completely ridiculous. It means that if I choose for my job to play the guitar in the park or throw rocks in the pond, I am entitled to a 'living wage' for my work.
Incorrect. If somebody hires you to play guitar in the park or throw rocks in the pond, then that person must pay you a living wage.
If you don't like your job you go find a better one. If you can't find a better job because (education, training, travel, etc.)? Fix your problem.
Right now about 20% of Americans can't do it, living on a wage that is close to minimal wage. This is basically a disaster in waiting.
An employer is never obligated to fix your life problems for you.
Nope. They just must pay a living wage. If they can't do it, then they go out of the business. End of the story.
If you don't like your job you go find a better one. If you can't find a better job because (education, training, travel, etc.)? Fix your problem.
Right now about 20% of Americans can't do it, living on a wage that is close to minimal wage. This is basically a disaster in waiting.
Isn't it funny how free marketeer capitalists looooove to bray about how if you aren't making enough money, just make more money.
And the orgasmic part is that companies like WalMart are sucking hard at the teats od socialism because they pay their employees so little that they are eligible for assistance.
Fucking commies pretending to be capitalists.
The shepherds did so well protecting the flock that the sheep no longer believed that wolves existed.
No, they pay what the job is WORTH. Again, not every job is meant for an adult to try to support a family.
No. Every job that requires full-time hours is meant to be able to support family. No ifs ands or buts. Anything else is pure slavery.
And about 'worth' - that's exactly why we have minimal wage, to avoid a never-ending spiral of race to the bottom. After all, there are always desperate people who would work for a dollar a day.
Did they sell at negative profit or did the expand beyond their cashflow? A lot of companies do that while grabbing market share.
I wish some of you, once you put down your pitchforks, would realize the government is basically taking 100% by taxing companies and what they pay employees and then turns around and taxes everything employees pay other people for their services. When is enough enough? People are crazy. I am glad Amazon can function and pay less. Heck I wouldn't be sad if they got paid by the government for creating jobs. Why are you all so backwards and hating companies? Is it because it's the in thing to do? They put the frigging food on the table and the table and the roof over the table. Stop hating them so much. Hate the government for writing a few laws yet taking all this damn money and still allowing our roads to crumble and us to kill broke people in countries with no money while spending trillions.
Two dirty pieces of shit throwing mud at each other. Both companies behave abysmally towards workers and there obligations.
It apparently blows right over your head that sentiments such as you quoted from FDR extended the great depression for another decade and that Germany and Israel just ran a nice experiment for us with regards to switching from European-style worker laws toward U.S. style levels of regulation instead and demonstrated quite clearly the economic and jobs damage your suggestions cause empirically.
It's amazing, if you stop passing laws either making it illegal to employ the least fortunate people among us (min. wage/living wage) or which discourages getting a job (lengthy unemployment benefits), suddenly people are working and being productive members of society.
You must really hate poor people if you're advocating for making it illegal for them to have a job. If you don't think that's what you're doing, then you don't understand economics. You might as well advocate for a law declaring everyone must have a personal fusion powerplant. That'll "solve" any energy issues in the same way.
The party of stupid and the party of evil get together and do something both stupid and evil, then call it bipartisan.
Not every job is meant for an adult to try to support a household from....
Nope. If you work a job full time then you deserve to be able to live off of it. Anything else is slavery.
OK, enough of the bullshit already. They call it a rat race for a reason. Technically, anyone who isn't financially independent is enslaved to work for 80% of their life. Pull your head out of your ass and understand why society is NOT inclined to pay the 16-year old burger flipper a living wage; because there are plenty of jobs that are justified to pay less than a living wage. Minimum wage is also a great motivator, and there's enough lazy people out there that need that in order for our society to not devolve into the minimal-effort generation.
If they're not worth paying a living wage for - then do them yourself. Is it not worth your time? Then it's at least worth paying someone else a reasonable portion of what you can sell an hour of your time for, to have them spend an hour of their life doing it for you. And the minimum reasonable portion to pay is what any non-desperate person might agree to - a living wage. Using someone's desperation as a weapon to get yourself a better deal is not an ethical negotiation strategy.
And as I said - I'm specifically NO T talking about "kids jobs" - I'm not inherently opposed to a separate minimum wage for minors. 50%? 30%? What's an hour of unskilled kids time worth compared to an hour of an unskilled adults? Make something up - the closer you get to the reality, the less you distort the adult labor market. But you also need to prevent the exploitation of desperate children. Not every kid has parents, and a dismaying number of them have really good reasons to distrust foster care.
But, if there aren't enough kids willing to do the work? Then you need to start hiring adults, and not cheat them just because they're desperate.
--- Most topics have many sides worth arguing, allow me to take one opposite you.
And nobody said anything about full time with benefits. We're just setting a minimum price that you're allowed to pay when you buy an hour of someone else's life.
--- Most topics have many sides worth arguing, allow me to take one opposite you.
I like how you neatly fail to mention that these "unpopular experiments" that have been so successful have set the minimum wage in Germany to roughly $15/hour, which along with free health care for everyone makes for a pretty reasonable living wage, given modest living expenses of $1000/month.
--- Most topics have many sides worth arguing, allow me to take one opposite you.
Are you really saying that low skill people shouldn't be hired full time? Is it ok if they work two part time jobs?
No. I'm saying that the salary paid for work must be enough to be livable if worked full time.
98% of full time worker earn more than minimum wage. The other 2% are almost all entry level workers in their first 6 months of employment. So obviously employers are nearly all paying more than they have to.
You are lying by omission. This is the number of workers earning exactly the federal minimum wage and most of states have local wages that are higher. If instead you raise the cutoff to $10.10 per hour (still below the livable wage) to account for the state-specific minimum wages then you get an appalling picture: https://www.pewresearch.org/fa... - 30% of all workers are paid less than $10.10 per hour.
Go to the Home Depot parking lot at 7 AM and try to hire an illegal Mexican for less than $10 per hour. Good luck. Even desperate people know the market value of their labor.
I will never do that, I value the labor. That being said, domestic help is often illegally paid less.
Define live. To me, living is enough to buy all the healthy food I want, send my kids to private school, buy new trucks, buy extra land, go on vacations, work from home when I want, enjoy the best health care, and remodel the home I own. Don't forget, I can take time off of work whenever I want and save for retirement. People working at Walmart can't even afford all of the basic nessesities. Nevermind having the good life I outlined above. They have no savingsand piles of debt.
Where should this "wage" and "tax" payment get created from?
From profit? How much should a brand have left to reinvest in their company after tax and wages?
Find a nation with lower costs than China and pass the saved money back as a "wage" and "tax" in the USA?
A company has to be a going concern and can't just support any "social compact", more "tax" and more "wages".
That money from selling products and services is needed for investment in a brands new products, ways of selling, workers, locations, ads....
Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
And what percentage of your salary in Germany do you have to pay in taxes?
I"m easily 33% here, likely more with all state/parish/city taxes added in on things....
I pay enough.
And if you start trying to force living wage on all full time jobs? Guess what?
No more minimum wage jobs...all part time.
What will you do next? Outlaw part time work?
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
they actively lobby for those State laws using bribery in the form of campaign contributions. When you say State Law makes it legal it's a bit like saying what Stalin did was legal since, well, he was doing it in the name of the state.
This isn't just a matter of "If you don't like it, change the law". This is a complete subversion of the mechanism of Democracy. We've got Voter Suppression, consolidation of media into propaganda arms (e.g. Sinclair Media), outright voter fraud (e.g. North Carolina's voter fraud, plus when happened in Georgia) and that's before we talk about how the American Senate was a reaction to populist uprisings from the cities done to give rural areas where the landed genrtry lived disproportionate power (remember, if you didn't own land back then you couldn't vote, so no, the Senate wasn't created to keep cities from overwhelming poor rural voters) and the god damned Electoral College.
What I'm saying is that when Democracy is as weak compared to moneyed powers as it is in the United States then you lose the right to appeal to "But what they did was legal".
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
And if you start trying to force living wage on all full time jobs? Guess what?
No more minimum wage jobs...all part time.
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
A pro-rated part-time job will still have to be livable. So nope, no such loopholes.
So it's an admission that Amazon is better than they are?
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
Illegal aliens occupy those jobs now, and they make less than minimum wage. It's OK though, the Americans who get displaced are the deplorables. No loss there. Fuck the working class losers. They need to learn to code.
Shutting down free speech with violence isn't fighting fascism. It IS fascism!
If you can't be bothered to depress the shift key why not skip the period key too? And why should people Sonic Hedgehog Tarantula Flea?
Fucking commies pretending to be capitalists.
This is so fucking true.
Another common manifestation of this is socialized losses, privatized profits.
And really, it makes sense.
Subverted socialism seems like the end-goal of any capitalist system, where the corporations have government influence, unless it is strictly regulated to prevent it.
Better than- that dude makes good money.
And if you start trying to force living wage on all full time jobs? Guess what?
No more minimum wage jobs...all part time.
That logic made my brain explode.
Do I need to explain to you why it's so bad?
No, your rephrasing of the assertion in a way that logically evaluates as false in comparison is completely ridiculous.
At least you've been moderated accordingly. You should be on TV.
Most of my family lives in the midwest. Arkansas and Oklahoma, specifically.
This is a trope I hear from them a lot. That the local Tyson plant has hired all illegal aliens to replace them.
It's of course false as fuck- the feds stop by monthly and make sure they're not doing it.
Really, the people are economically depressed because their population is growing, and their economy is not.
As the US started requiring more chicken, they didn't put more of it through that factory, they built more factories.
It's a sad situation, made even more sad by the sheer lack of understanding that the victims of that system have for it.
What's even sadder, is that they're being manipulated by racists to clear out the "brown people problem"
I"m easily 33% here,
Not including state and local? In the US?
No, no you're not.
Fucking commies pretending to be capitalists.
This is so fucking true. Another common manifestation of this is socialized losses, privatized profits. And really, it makes sense. Subverted socialism seems like the end-goal of any capitalist system, where the corporations have government influence, unless it is strictly regulated to prevent it.
Exactly. The think that is so inverted is that while Libertarians freak out about any regulation of restraint because that would be Government controlling the corporations - corporations are now the real government.
So, socialism. Yet people eat that shit up. It is like the concept of universal health care. The question the sycophants always ask is "How are we going to pay for this?"
The answer of course, is we are already paying more than that to corporatized medicine.
Socialism, dirty filthy socialism for the insurance industry.
The shepherds did so well protecting the flock that the sheep no longer believed that wolves existed.
Hilarious because there are no commies/capitalists/whatever, there are only assholes trying to exploit you. And oh boy, are you all being taken for a ride...
I knew Dale Gribble was going to show up eventually.
The shepherds did so well protecting the flock that the sheep no longer believed that wolves existed.
Sounds like Germany's tax starts at a marginal rate of 14%, you're presumably paying no more than that for a minimum-wage job.
No more full time jobs? You mean a whole lot of people are paying for a whole lot of work that doesn't need to be done? Unlikely. No doubt some jobs of marginal utility will be cut, but all those people making twice as much money (because you doubled the minimum wage) are going to be buying several times as much stuff, now that most of their paycheck isn't going to rent and bare survival. Which means you need a lot more people serving them. The thing about increasing the minimum wage, is that such people tend to spend money as fast as they get it, rather than putting a lot into savings and investments that generate no economic activity.
>What will you do next? Outlaw part time work?
Minimum wage isn't about how much you take home at the end of the week - it's about the minimum amount you can pay for one hour of someone else's life. The idea being to keep you from using their desperation for a job to cheat them out of a living wage - that's not an ethical negotiation tactic.
--- Most topics have many sides worth arguing, allow me to take one opposite you.
I mean, we've already seen similar things happen.
You force companies to give medical benefits to all full time employees, even low wag ones....what happened?
Employee hours were cut to just under the full time standard for many low wage employees.
IN areas that forced $15/hr for all min wage jobs, what happened?
A net loss of jobs.
So, sure, if you force a living wage on full time jobs as you say, even ones that are not worth it...you will see hours cut so that they are no long "full time", and you also will see less of those jobs.
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
Nope. If you work a job full time then you deserve to be able to live off of it.
Really? No matter how useful or useless you are to a particular employer for a particular job or to employers in general?
No matter how rare or plentiful are people with such usefulness to a particular employer for a particular job or to employers in general?
Anything else is slavery.
Really? Can employees be sold to other companies? Can they be sold to individuals or groups of individuals or organizations or governments? In short, can they be sold? In short, are they property?
There's no time like the present. Well, the past used to be.
Not every job is meant for an adult to try to support a household from....
True. In fact, the other jobs are not, either. No jobs are "meant" at all.
They are offered, and either accepted or rejected by potential employees. And that acceptance may be canceled, if the employee finds the employer is not satisfactory. And that offer may be canceled, if the employer finds the employee is not satisfactory.
Frequently, low-paid jobs for low-skilled or unproven workers are held by people who are not adults, or by adults who are not trying to support a household with that job.
But that's an observation, not a decree from whoever is in charge of deciding what jobs "mean".
Yeah, I'm kinda quibbling. But casual phrasing that was not intended to be taken literally often leads to sloppy thinking on the part of those who read it.
For examples of that sort of sloppy thinking, you won't have to look far. This thread, for instance.
There's no time like the present. Well, the past used to be.
If the job isn't worth paying a non-desperate person to do it, then leave it un-done.
--- Most topics have many sides worth arguing, allow me to take one opposite you.
So prices rise to cover the cost of a living wage but then you need more money to pay the higher prices so the living wage has to increase. Where does it end?
And what about those who can't find a job?
Absolutely. But if we're talking flipping burgers or other supposedly "kid jobs" that are making someone a profit?
My inclination is that it it's a job that involves a formal employment agreement reported to the IRS, it should get a living wage.
--- Most topics have many sides worth arguing, allow me to take one opposite you.
Alright, I guess I do.
The living wage is hourly.
A company will not reduce its amount of full time employees due to a living wage requirement.
Company needs X hours of labor. It matters not if it's X/40, or X/30. The pay is the same.
Now, as far as benefits are concerned- that is a different discussion that you're less wrong about, basically specifically on legal full-time benefit requirements, so quite obviously not relevant to the discussion regarding minimum compensation.
If you require a "living wage" for full time employees, and not for part time....then yes, you will see less full time jobs.
They'll hire 2x part time employees to cover the former full time employee, and cover the full time hours with two staggered employees.
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
IN areas that forced $15/hr for all min wage jobs, what happened? A net loss of jobs.
Nope. WA has imposed $15/hr min wage and the number of jobs has increased.
So prices rise to cover the cost of a living wage but then you need more money to pay the higher prices so the living wage has to increase. Where does it end?
At some equilibrium wage. Calculations show that the increases in min. wage will stop to be effective at around $25 per hour.
For the new, globally minded progressives, the mere well-being of American workers is not a good enough reason to oppose immigration or trade liberalization. It's an argument that today's progressive globalists have borrowed from libertarians: immigration or trade that depresses the wages of Americans is still justified if it makes immigrants or foreign workers better off. In other words, fuck you, working class.
Shutting down free speech with violence isn't fighting fascism. It IS fascism!
If you require a "living wage" for full time employees, and not for part time....then yes, you will see less full time jobs.
That's not the proposal. The "Living Wage" is an hourly rate that would be a living wage, if 40 hours are worked.
I'm not sure what you think it is.
2 employees working 20 hours a week will cost more than 1 employee working 40.
Wages will be the same, HR overhead will be higher.
Sure. I get the argument. But if your argument is good, why do you have to make shit up to get people to believe it?
If you have a grill that needs someone in front of it all day long, they should be paid a livable wage. If you can't afford that, you can't afford to be in business. Why should we subsidize businesses that are killing other businesses by abusing their employees to undercut on price.
Cheap storage VM.
American's pay more then 33% in taxes, when you count the hidden parts. They pay a large percentage to private insurance companies, and a large part is hidden and payed by employers, to SS and again private insurance companies.
Cheap storage VM.