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Netflix Posted Biggest-Ever Profit in 2018 and Paid $0 in Income Taxes

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Re: Netflix Posted Biggest-Ever Profit in 2018 and Paid $0 in Income Taxes

#251

Post by brianpgordon »

jjallen wrote: post #111

There can be a huge difference between "income tax expense", which will be the numerator for any headline income tax rate and "income taxes paid". For Netflix this is true for 2018. In fact they paid $131 million for income taxes, which, as a percent of their income is way higher than "$0" which the original article claims in its. Also, the article makes no mention of R&D tax credits, which saved NFLX $141 million in…

> Netflix says the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017 _cost_ them an additional $79 million

$32 million of that was paid to repatriate foreign profits that they would have had to pay even more to repatriate before the tax cut.

Re: Netflix Posted Biggest-Ever Profit in 2018 and Paid $0 in Income Taxes

#252

Post by throwawaymath »

jki275 wrote: post #198
citilife wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not siding one way or the other, that will definitely limit the amount of expertise that comes with a Congressman/Congresswoman. Think about it, it takes at least six months for us to learn our jobs, they have to learn about hundreds of things ongoing in the government before they can make informed decisions. You then even rely more on lobbyists (or "experts") who at least generally know what they are talking about.…

I would argue that congresspeople are not experts in general in most (all in some cases?) domains, and make generally totally uninformed decisions that are designed to pander to a political base. And lobbyists aren't experts either, they're simply paid to bribe people to get a result.

> And lobbyists aren't experts either, they're simply paid to bribe people to get a result.

This implies that the EFF does not have expertise in privacy and free speech. Would you agree with that?

Re: Netflix Posted Biggest-Ever Profit in 2018 and Paid $0 in Income Taxes

#253

Post by AsyncAwait »

ahoy wrote: post #196
wolco wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Lobbyist being experts is something I've never heard before. They are salesmen, do you want to get your nutrient information from a McDonald's commercial? It may save you time but isn't really helpful.

The EFF, trade unions, the aclu, the southern poverty law center, all of these are experts and all of them lobby policymakers.

And all of them can still be easily outspend by corporate lobbying.

Re: Netflix Posted Biggest-Ever Profit in 2018 and Paid $0 in Income Taxes

#254

Post by [deleted] »

driverdan wrote: post #34

Rather than being outraged at the headline, what are the actual details? Why were they able to pay no taxes? Was it due to carried losses or something like that? Anyone mad at a company for not pay taxes is misdirecting their anger. Companies follow the law. If you don't like the law elect different politicians. Don't get mad at companies that follow the law.

[deleted]

Re: Netflix Posted Biggest-Ever Profit in 2018 and Paid $0 in Income Taxes

#255

Post by hoaw »

skh wrote: post #142
clarkmoody wrote: post #55

Populist clickbait headline is clickbait. I'm sure Netflix paid tons in employer contributions to employee income taxes, social security taxes, etc. They probably paid a bunch in sales taxes where they made purchases. Property taxes for data centers, office buildings, etc. So there are many more taxes that everyone pays beyond the income tax. As others have pointed out, the tax code is immensely complex, but you prob…

I'm sure Netflix paid tons in employer contributions to employee income taxes, social security taxes, etc. This situation should not be viewed as Netflix paying tax. An employee's benefits, pay, time off, etc. are all part of the compensation of an employee. If Netflix did not pay this on behalf of the employee then the employee would have to pay it. For instance, for contractors they (the contractor) pay the full FI…

It is an important distinction. Contributions pay for employees, taxes pay for a successful society where companies can be successful. When companies end up not paying much tax, the feedback loop between successful companies and a successful society is broken. Society therefor no longer has an incentive, or even ability, to provide new opportunities for people. Instead you end up in a unsustainable situation where the incentive is to try and capture what is already there and not to creating new things.

Re: Netflix Posted Biggest-Ever Profit in 2018 and Paid $0 in Income Taxes

#256

Post by macspoofing »

chanandler_bong wrote: post #84
blackguardx wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Companies also lobby heavily for these tax laws. The laws may be directly responsible, but big companies share some blame as well.

The answer is to outlaw lobbyists, it would fix a lot of problems. That, and enact term limits for Congress. That will fix even more.

>The answer is to outlaw lobbyists, it would fix a lot of problems.

No it wouldn't. Our current regulated lobby 'industry' is an attempt to control something that would happen ANYWAY if it was made illegal. Furthermore, lobbying is necessary and a core part of any democracy. You need to be able to petition your representative government for changes, regardless if you're a regular citizen, an activist, a business owner, or even a corporate entity.

Re: Netflix Posted Biggest-Ever Profit in 2018 and Paid $0 in Income Taxes

#257

Post by mbar84 »

equalunique wrote: post #192

If everyone who is an employee of the company must pay taxes on their income anyways, then what's the point of taxing companies themselves - so they can be taxed for the company income on top of the taxes already paid on operating costs on top of more taxes for employee salary? What rationale is there besides wanting to give the government more revenue? Shareholders might have gained a lot, but whatever they make on…

The point is to get as much money as possible duh.

The fact is, a company is a fiction and the idea that you can tax a fiction is just...fiction. But if the state didn't do it, then one or all of the following might notice that in reality they are paying quite more taxes than is actually leaving their account: employees, investors/owners/shareholders, suppliers.

Re: Netflix Posted Biggest-Ever Profit in 2018 and Paid $0 in Income Taxes

#258

Post by clairity »

briandear wrote: post #188
gammateam wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From the article > "In fact, the company reported a $22 million federal income tax rebate." So if they paid 131 in income taxes, and received 141 in tax credits, then that accounts for $10 million of the $22 million the article mentions. That's pretty cool, I was assuming their earnings were just debt fueled. Therefore spending more money than they made, which is always a fun way of not sending that money to the gove…

It is more productive. Taxes always result in some amount of deadweight loss. $10 million spent in the private sector is mathematically more productive than $10 million paid to the government. https://www.investopedia.com/terms/d/deadweight-loss-of-taxa...

in theory (mathematically) it's more productive (in operating businesses that can put the capital to good use quickly), but in practice, that's not necessarily true. markets are not perfectly efficient, and have hidden losses as well (e.g., productive asssets being sidelined due to competition). governments are capable of putting capital to good use (hoover dam --> california expansion, at the expense of the environment, a hidden cost).

neither markets nor governments are perfect, and such superficial arguments are at best misleading. you can't just compare idealized markets to practicing governments to reach substantive understanding.

Re: Netflix Posted Biggest-Ever Profit in 2018 and Paid $0 in Income Taxes

#259

Post by throwawaymath »

xienze wrote: post #201
moorhosj wrote: post #160

Earlier quoted context omitted.

==They're certainly not subject matter experts in anything outside that realm.== Except many of them clearly are. Bill Foster worked as a particle physicist at Fermilab for 22 years [1]. Sean Casten started and sold an energy recycling company called Recycled Energy Development [2]. Those are two examples just from suburban Chicago. Try not to let political cynicism cloud reality. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bi…

> Except many of them clearly are. How many? And I think it's particularly telling that the folks you managed to find are newbies to the political arena and not career politicians, a class of individuals that can only exist thanks to the absence of term limits. Also telling is that in Foster's case, his expertise is completely useless in a political context. Let me know when he gets around to drafting a major particl…

You made a claim that lobbyists are not subject matter experts. Another commenter refuted that claim with counterexamples. Now you are moving the goalposts and demanding quantifiable data about how many lobbyists have expertise in some domain.

I think it's time for you to counter by defending your thesis, that lobbyists generally don't have domain expertise, instead of demanding increasingly more evidence.

Re: Netflix Posted Biggest-Ever Profit in 2018 and Paid $0 in Income Taxes

#260

Post by jlarocco »

driverdan wrote: post #34

Rather than being outraged at the headline, what are the actual details? Why were they able to pay no taxes? Was it due to carried losses or something like that? Anyone mad at a company for not pay taxes is misdirecting their anger. Companies follow the law. If you don't like the law elect different politicians. Don't get mad at companies that follow the law.

I'm not sure the point of these articles is to make people mad at the companies. Nobody expects a large public company to break the law evading taxes because they have to release their numbers, so what they're doing must be legal.

The best way to highlight loopholes and broken parts of the tax system is to point out when they're being used and taken advantage of.

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