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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

#341

Post by pathseeker »

AlexTWithBeard wrote: post #329
chongli wrote: post #283

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why is it so naturally assumed to be acceptable for a business to do it? Because a business isn't a person. Taxing a business is taking real money away from payrolls, money that would get taxed again anyway once it was paid out. Corporate income tax only makes sense when you look at it as a barrier to entry for competition in the marketplace. Big companies like Netflix know how to avoid taxes. Small companies don't.…

Taxing a business is taking real money away from payrolls Correct me if I'm wrong, but I think payroll expenses are not a part of profit, so no double taxation here.

>Correct me if I'm wrong, but I think payroll expenses are not a part of profit, so no double taxation here.

The point is that any money that exits a corporation gets taxed again somewhere.

So if a company does really well one year and makes a profit, it gets taxed on that profit even if it keeps it in the bank. Then they use that remaining profit to pay payroll next year and then employees or owners get taxed again.

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

#342

Post by isostatic »

hcnews wrote: post #223
AlexB138 wrote: post #162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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. When you think there are simple answers to big problems it's generally because you don't actually understand the problem. How would you outlaw lobbyists? Setting aside the fact that it would be unconstitutional, do you think it should be illegal for you to air your grievances to elec…

> When you think there are simple answers to big problems it's generally because you don't actually understand the problem. Funny. Most complex problems have simple solutions. It takes lot more effort to do it, but the simple solutions tend to stick around the longest. This is based on 10 years of work exp in top tech companies :-) The only place when simple solutions don't work is when people have other vested inter…

For every complex problem there is an answer that is clear, simple, and wrong.

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

#343

Post by MetalGuru »

SilasX wrote: post #189
otachack wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not that simple. Companies lobby to keep, even coerce, laws that benefit them and allow these sorts of things to happen. What is the common person, or collection of persons, supposed to do when they are against that kind of force? I believe one way is to actually be involved in politics and get into the seats that govern and make the laws. But it's easier said than done.

It is that simple (in the sense of the parent's post): you need to know the specifics of why they were paying no taxes. If, as in the comment, they were carrying over losses, then there's nothing really objectionable. You lost $10 million last year. You profited $10 million this year. Over a reasonable horizon, you weren't profitable. Did they get a specific exemption against the public interest that no one else got?…

Do losses actually carry forward in full like you're describing? I was under the impression there was an annual limit in the amount you can deduct. For an individual, that limit is $3k.

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

#344

Post by war1025 »

conanbatt wrote: post #221
war1025 wrote: post #161

Paid $0 in taxes always seems a bit disingenuous to me, since they pay labor and equipment costs that are all indirectly taxed. These companies may not pay taxes in the ways we would like them to, or naively expect them to, but the government still ends up with a lot of money in their coffers on account of them.

Companies are not people: they never pay taxes. Either shareholders, employees or consumers pay taxes.

Exactly.

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

#345

Post by acd »

When Corporations pay zero in tax there is no schools being built, no healthcare being paid, no roads being paved. Yet these companies reap the benefit of other tax payers through educated labor and paying subscribers. They do not pay for the fire department, the police department and hospitals.

One word to describe it is Leeching.

Just because you could do something does not mean you have the right to do so.

Here is the Golden rule https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Golden_Rule "One should treat others as one would like others to treat oneself (positive or directive form)."

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

#346

Post by MetalGuru »

nsxwolf wrote: post #284
PurpleBoxDragon wrote: post #261

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Over a reasonable horizon, you weren't profitable. The average worker isn't allowed to do that even when they lose money in a given year. Why is it so naturally assumed to be acceptable for a business to do it? Maybe the time is to just remove the loopholes in general from both business and personal income taxes.

What do you mean by "lose money"? There are plenty of kinds of losses that the average worker might incur that would offset their income tax. It could be a capital loss on an investment. It could be casualty losses from theft or a fire.

Casualty losses are tax deductible? That seems like it would be hard to verify if you got audited.

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

#347

Post by MetalGuru »

el_cujo wrote: post #308
a-priori wrote: post #276

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know about American taxes, but at least in Canada individuals can do this for capital gains / losses. If you have investments that produce losses one year, you can carry those losses forward to cancel out capital gains in following years and reduce your tax payable.

This is how it works in America as well.

But the max per year is $3k, which is garbage.

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

#348

Post by dawhizkid »

The $10k cap on SALT (state and local tax) deductions starting with the 2018 tax year will be shocking to many people on here living in high tax blue states like CA or NY/NJ. If you have a very average wage and modest property in these states you'll almost definitely pay more this year than in previous years.

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

#349

Post by a-priori »

chanandler_bong wrote: post #79
otachack wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not that simple. Companies lobby to keep, even coerce, laws that benefit them and allow these sorts of things to happen. What is the common person, or collection of persons, supposed to do when they are against that kind of force? I believe one way is to actually be involved in politics and get into the seats that govern and make the laws. But it's easier said than done.

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.

In theory lobbyists perform a public good: they create legislation that someone wants. The problem is that we only have them for groups that have the money to pay lobbyists, so the only lobbyist-originated bills that cross legislators' desks are the ones representing a narrow set of interests.

So rather than outlaw lobbyists, one alternative would be to balance this out by hiring public lobbyists. They would craft the legislation on behalf of the state.

The analogy I'm thinking of is that this would work in much the same way that we hire public prosecutors to represent the public interests in the courts by prosecuting criminal cases on behalf of the state. Otherwise the only criminal cases would be if someone hired a private prosecutor, as it was until the 18th century.

Currently the bill-writing is the responsibility of legislators and parties. This would make it a non-political, non-partisan role in the bureaucracy.

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

#350

Post by anigbrowl »

OrwellianChild wrote: post #309
PurpleBoxDragon wrote: post #261

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Over a reasonable horizon, you weren't profitable. The average worker isn't allowed to do that even when they lose money in a given year. Why is it so naturally assumed to be acceptable for a business to do it? Maybe the time is to just remove the loopholes in general from both business and personal income taxes.

If the average worker has any stock or index fund investments, that worker absolutely can take advantage of this (in the U.S.). It's called tax-loss harvesting - worth reading about here [1]. [1] https://www.madfientist.com/tax-loss-harvesting/

There is no good reason investment income should be privileged over income from labor.
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