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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

#391

Post by 6cd6beb »

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.

A senate race costs a few million. 20 at most.

Netflix revenue for 1 year was 845 million.

Netflix can afford a few senators if they want. Instead they just lobby existing legislators and put bills on their desks.

Corporations are not just "following the law", they're writing it.

>If you don't like the law elect different politicians

How? Government officials are far more beholden to corporations like netflix than they are to people like us. If push comes to shove then corporations can spend a trivial amount of money to crack the consensus among the group of people pushing for change.

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

#392

Post by spikels »

PurpleBoxDragon wrote: post #261
SilasX wrote: post #189

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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?…

>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.

How does the average worker make a loss? People are not going to be working for negative wages. Only investors or business make loses.

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

#393

Post by laurencerowe »

codexon wrote: post #364
OrwellianChild wrote: post #309

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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/

You can only harvest $3000 in losses per year if you have more capital losses than capital gains. That is laughably small. And you can't deduct the losses from your other income while you can as a business.

There is no limit to the amount of capital losses carried over (i.e. harvested) year to year. These must first be applied against any capital gains (no limit AFAIK.) The $3000 limit applies to the annual amount of capital losses that may be written off against other income.

Example, in year 1 you have a $15,000 net capital loss. You write off the maximum $3,000 of this against your other income, carrying over a $12,000 capital loss. In year 2 you have a $10,000 net capital gain, this is offset against your carried over loss leaving $2,000 to write off against your income.

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

#394

Post by shimms »

throwaway190102 wrote: post #356
pathseeker wrote: post #341

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>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.

I don't think that's quite how that works. But your point on double-taxation is certainly valid in some contexts.

Some jurisdictions (Australia) have input credits that offset tax already paid on dividends. If a company has paid 30% tax on a profit and distributes dividends to shareholders, the individual pays tax on it at their marginal tax rate less the tax already paid by the company (fully franked dividend).

Franking credits minimise the double taxation issue in these instances.

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

#395

Post by BeetleB »

wolco wrote: post #137
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.…

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.

If you ignore the highly politicized lobbyists, you'll find that expertise is one of the main things lobbyists provide to politicians.

"We know you don't have time to dig deep. Here is a summary of the research, and our recommendations based on it."

Edit: I also once had a fairly cynical view of lobbyists. But then some people I know went to work for lobby groups after they graduated. When I looked into the types of lobby groups they went to, they were fairly impressive. Things like advocating for homeless, advocating for people without health care, etc.

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

#396

Post by parineum »

xenophon wrote: post #130
markovbot wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've voted in every election I since I turned 18 and nothing seems to have been done about this and many other things. But issues that megacorps care about happen right away. Voting isn't a real solution to unchecked corporate lobbying.

The solution is reversing Citizen's United, when the Supreme Court held 5-4 that campaign contributions represented "freedom of speech" and could not be limited. In a literal sense, Citizen's United enshrined the idea that your voice (and vote) are proportional to the amount of money you can bring to bear. One of the lessons I've taken from this case and others related to gerrymandering and voter suppression, for ins…

Citizen's United affirmed that an individual's rights to make political speech isn't lost when that individual forms a corporation for the sole purpose of amplifying that speech.

It's equivalent (this isn't an analogy, it's literally equivalent) to allowing a person to spend money to buy a megaphone to make their speech literally louder than everyone else's. Not everyone can afford a megaphone.

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

#397

Post by refurb »

MetalGuru wrote: post #347
el_cujo wrote: post #308

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is how it works in America as well.

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

$3k max to offset other income. There is no limit to offset capital gains.

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

#398

Post by awakeasleep »

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?…

Your argument is a form of 'this is too complicated for you to understand' .. aka bullshit.

The average joe doesn't need to grok the whole tax code to know it's wrong when one of the most high profile profitable companies doesn't pay any income tax.

That indicates the system is fucked. There isn't a technicality in the universe that will indicate that somehow our perception is wrong.

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

#399

Post by andrepd »

e1g wrote: post #322
deeviant wrote: post #292

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except a large portion of revenue does not go to workers, but to shareholders, who pay far less taxes then those who strain their backs in creating said revenue.

Except for outliers like Apple, it is atypical for shareholders to get more of revenues than the workers. Payroll, benefits, offices, etc are easily >50% of revenue in virtually all ventures (including diamond trade and definitely your favourite tech unicorn)

[citation needed]

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

#400

Post by refurb »

justrudd wrote: post #179
manux wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

$3.7 billion a year is a lot. There aren't that many politicians to bribe.

If you keep it only at the federal level and assume that staff isn't being "lobbied", 100 senators 435 representatives 1 President 1 Vice President ~7 million dollars per person per year :)

You do realize those aren't cash payments to the politician, right?
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