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FedEx responds to The New York Times article from Nov. 17, 2019

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Re: FedEx responds to The New York Times article from Nov. 17, 2019

#161

Post by zepto »

networkimprov wrote: post #149
philwelch wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The writing of a journalist employed by the NYT, edited by an editor employed by the NYT, for publication in a newspaper sold by the NYT for profit is every bit as much a commercial activity as FedEx delivering packages. In this case the NYT has a target market that is reflexively skeptical of businesses and commercial activity so it is useful for them to obscure what they are doing. The fact remains that the NYT is…

>the NYT is a business primarily focused on seeking profit, no different from FedEx That is incorrect, albeit precisely what FedEx (and many other subjects of investigative journalism) would like us to believe. When "all news is fake news" becomes widespread public perception, that public is doomed to authoritarian rule, most likely by leaders backed by the business elite.

How is incorrect that the NYT is a business primarily focused on seeking profit?

Re: FedEx responds to The New York Times article from Nov. 17, 2019

#162

Post by frockington1 »

mmazing wrote: post #37
Shivetya wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

NYT and a few other papers are pretty much running in campaign mode, floating trial balloons of policy ideas of candidates they favor if not outright pushing forward a narrative which aligns with the direction one campaign or another is following. So stories align to support the narrative. The 2020 narrative for the Democratic Party is again wealth envy and how all the woes can be solved if X just pays their fair sha…

How do you feel about the difference in income tax rates from the mid twentieth century to now for the upper wealth brackets?

A step in the right direction. The lower the better in my opinion, the federal government is long past its prime

Re: FedEx responds to The New York Times article from Nov. 17, 2019

#163

Post by nybble41 »

js2 wrote: post #54
pitaj wrote: post #40

Corporate taxes shouldn't exist, especially in their current form. Corporate taxes are just reflected to consumers as higher prices or to workers as lower wages. In the current structure, corporate taxes benefit large businesses more with large legal departments because they can afford to take advantage of deductions etc. Corporate taxes should be replaced by an increase in capital gains tax.

> Corporate taxes are just reflected to consumers as higher prices or to workers as lower wages. The United States has had a corporate income tax since 1909, but in all the years since there is a major question about it that economists haven’t been able to answer satisfactorily: who pays it? [...] Probably most people assume that the corporate income tax is largely paid by consumers of its products or services. That…

Who are the consumers? We are.

Who are the workers? We are.

Who are the shareholders? We are.

No matter which role you allocate the cost of the tax to, in the end it's us who are paying the bill. Even if you're one of those rare individuals without investments of your own, you still benefit from them. Punishing the shareholders who provide the capital to produce goods more efficiently isn't going to make the goods you consume any cheaper.

Re: FedEx responds to The New York Times article from Nov. 17, 2019

#164

Post by zepto »

wavefunction wrote: post #113
adamrezich wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>It is crazy to see this as an official statement from a Fortune 100 company. No it's not—the era of "journalists" being de facto arbiters of truth is most definitely over.

There was never an era like that, it's more nonsense and outright propaganda from schemers who want to claim that their own free-style lies are just as valid as formal journalism.

What is this ‘formal journalism’ you are talking about, and how does it differ from for-profit publishing?

Re: FedEx responds to The New York Times article from Nov. 17, 2019

#165

Post by annoyingnoob »

frockington1 wrote: post #154
annoyingnoob wrote: post #140

Sounds like FedEx wants a public forum to push Reaganonmics. Arguing for trickle-down theory is a bad look, FedEx. 'Creating jobs' is not an excuse for skipping out on taxes. You invest to grow your business but you still need to pay taxes. If I invest all of my money in a house I create, at least temporary, jobs. I push a bunch of cash through the economy in taxes, fees to a number of services, etc. I would have inv…

Should I then get to skip paying taxes for one or more years? - Yes and you do. You get a tax credit on interest paid and many new build come with tax abatement to encourage investment opportunities

My tax bill tells me otherwise. The interest on my home loan does not and cannot erase my taxes. That deduction is not what you think it is: https://www.fool.com/millionacres/taxes/real-estate-tax-dedu...

My home happens to include Mello-Roos taxes for local improvements, like schools and a fire station. This more than doubles the property tax that I pay.

Sorry to tell you, I don't have it anything like FedEx. I paid over 26% of my gross income on taxes last year.

Re: FedEx responds to The New York Times article from Nov. 17, 2019

#166

Post by zepto »

CamperBob2 wrote: post #111
adamrezich wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why is this even up for debate? Why would anyone think that the NYT is more useful to the economy than FedEx? Why do people continue to put ""journalism"" on such a high pedestal? Like, what actual value did the NYT article produce? At worst it could have potentially negatively affected the FedEx stock price and overall popular perception, for no good reason other than to generate clicks/ad views.

Why would anyone think that the NYT is more useful to the economy than FedEx? Here's one point of view that doesn't come up as often as it should: the First Amendment doesn't say anything about churches that it doesn't also say about the press. Yet we don't tax churches on the grounds that "the power to tax is the power to destroy." [1] If it weren't for this double standard, the Times would indeed be justified in pa…

Acknowledging that newspapers are just as biased as religious texts would be fine.

Re: FedEx responds to The New York Times article from Nov. 17, 2019

#167

Post by Reedx »

networkimprov wrote: post #149
philwelch wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The writing of a journalist employed by the NYT, edited by an editor employed by the NYT, for publication in a newspaper sold by the NYT for profit is every bit as much a commercial activity as FedEx delivering packages. In this case the NYT has a target market that is reflexively skeptical of businesses and commercial activity so it is useful for them to obscure what they are doing. The fact remains that the NYT is…

>the NYT is a business primarily focused on seeking profit, no different from FedEx That is incorrect, albeit precisely what FedEx (and many other subjects of investigative journalism) would like us to believe. When "all news is fake news" becomes widespread public perception, that public is doomed to authoritarian rule, most likely by leaders backed by the business elite.

Run this experiment:

1) Subscribe to NYT

2) Notice they are still serving you ads

3) Try to cancel your subscription

Re: FedEx responds to The New York Times article from Nov. 17, 2019

#168

Post by mthoms »

appleiigs wrote: post #122
Majromax wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The idle cash that corporations have aren't generating jobs. But that contradicts the claimed raison d'être for the 2018 tax cut: that corporate direct investment was being restrained by corporate income taxes. A call to lower corporate income taxes so more money could flow to investors would have been consistent, both with economic orthodoxy and with the observed outcome.

> more money could flow to investors Is that a bad thing? I'm thinking it is good. Why do people want higher taxes for? I'm thinking lower taxes reduces the amount of money going to the government is good. The government is horribly inefficient due things such as bureaucracy, corruption, etc. No matter where they operate, it hasn't been good. Whether it's US or China, the gov't is not where I think money should go.

>No matter where they operate, it hasn't been good.

That's what the rich hand powerful want you to think. But the facts don't support it. Look at any of the other top western democracies. You know, the ones with longer lifespans, more upward mobility, happier populations, better infrastructure, better education, and so on.

I'm not suggesting that those countries are perfect or that there aren't gross inefficiencies, but the widespread belief that good government is basically impossible, so why even try is mostly an American (right wing) phenomenon.

Other top-tier western style democracies, despite their many imperfections, are doing just fine.

Re: FedEx responds to The New York Times article from Nov. 17, 2019

#169

Post by frockington1 »

WhompingWindows wrote: post #26

Wow, let's get more debates between various institutions, not sure why we don't have more to begin with. For instance, why is it that the Democratic and GOP primaries never crossed paths? Shouldn't they have organized some R vs D debates before the final two candidates? Or what about FCC vs net neutrality advocates? Kaepernick vs Police Chief? I can think of lots of interesting pairings that will sadly never happen.

I would be interesting in opening up debates like those you mentioned. The hard part would be attracting the average person and not just people with extreme or conspiracy-theorists views

Re: FedEx responds to The New York Times article from Nov. 17, 2019

#170

Post by [deleted] »

CPLX wrote: post #25

This is stupid. The NY Times, as a business, wasn't a subject of the article. It's not a competition between a media company and a shipping company. It's a piece of journalism. Either that journalism is accurate or it isn't. If it's wrong they should issue a correction, or review how it could be misleading or slanted and offer an alternate perspective. If it's correct they should stand by it. In no event does the wri…

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