Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Netflix Made Record Profits in 2020, Paid a Tax Rate of Less Than 1 Percent

itep.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

81–90 of 404 posts

Re: Netflix Made Record Profits in 2020, Paid a Tax Rate of Less Than 1 Percent

#81

Post by Guthur »

mjthompson wrote: post #69
crispyambulance wrote: post #15

It would be perfectly fine for corporations to pay comically low taxes--- IF they also had NO ability to fund large-scale lobbying operations and were not allowed to put unlimited amounts of money into political campaigns. That's NOT ever going to happen. But now is the best time for the tax part to change. The economy has been floated by unprecedented government pay-outs, narrowly avoiding a deep depression that wou…

Corporations enjoy signficant benefits of being in the state, including, for example, a police force that protects them from attack, and a legal system that will resolve disputes they have both internally and with others. They should pay reasonable (not low) taxes in any event, not subject to the caveat you identify.

Everyone they employ already pays tax.

Everyone that gets a dividend pays tax.

Everyone that enjoys capital growth pays tax.

Just looking at the direct corporate tax rate is grossly myopic.

Re: Netflix Made Record Profits in 2020, Paid a Tax Rate of Less Than 1 Percent

#82

Post by refurb »

ocdtrekkie wrote: post #77
chaoxu wrote: post #62

I actually don't get why corporation should pay taxes. When the profit of the company is distributed, or paying the employees, the employees/shareholders will be taxed on that money.

Well, one problem is this just encourages companies to collect and never disburse funds to employers or shareholders. Companies in some cases are holding onto hundreds of billions in cash offshore. Your idea would make that money free to keep out of the economy and out of employee's hands.

Why would a company just sit on funds like that? It makes no sense. Any cash a company has is usually in short term investments.

The current offshore “hoarding” is actually due to the current tax code.

Re: Netflix Made Record Profits in 2020, Paid a Tax Rate of Less Than 1 Percent

#83

Post by areyousure »

lotsofpulp wrote: post #36
cies wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Dont forget: consumers also pay the taxes of the companies as they are factored into the costs of products and services. What matters here is the relative incentive/disincentive that taxation signals. 40% on income from labour shows: dont get income from labour! Small percent on income from property (dividents, etc) show that that's the best place to get money from. Almost zero percent on pollution signals: go for it…

What is the source for 40% tax on income for labor? https://www.irs.com/articles/2020-federal-tax-rates-brackets... If you’re adding state taxes, note that the linked article is discussing federal income taxes only. Even then, including state taxes does not get you to 40% for 99% of people.

For (single) self-employed people making between ~$85k and $137k, the marginal federal tax rate they face is a little under 40%, with 24% from your link, ~12% from Social security, and ~3% from Medicare. This excludes the effect of phaseouts of various deductions (eg, student loan interest), which can easily drive that higher while remaining within the context of federal taxation only.

Re: Netflix Made Record Profits in 2020, Paid a Tax Rate of Less Than 1 Percent

#85

Post by carmen_sandiego »

lotsofpulp wrote: post #19
tlholaday wrote: post #11

> Among the mechanisms Netflix is using to achieve its next-to-nothing tax liability are accelerated depreciation (which appears to have cut the company’s tax expense by $148 million); deductions for stock options for Netflix executives and other employees ($339 million); and research and development tax credits ($113 million). These are straightforward deductions.

It’s almost predictable which “hot takes” will get clicks/attention.

I don't think it's almost predictable, I think it is predictable and that's why editors do it.

Re: Netflix Made Record Profits in 2020, Paid a Tax Rate of Less Than 1 Percent

#86

Post by thejackgoode »

dpkrjb wrote: post #59
varispeed wrote: post #12

This is crazy how economy is tilted in favour of these big corporations. If you are a worker, it is not uncommon to pay over 40% of tax and if you work on your own small business you can pay even more and have very little left to reinvest. Then you have progressive tax that is preventing you from saving much - if you want to save for a deposit to buy a house, spend time on education and getting a better job, you'll g…

I remember reading that employment numbers is often a case big Corps make when they warrant dodging tax. “We employe X thousand people who contribute Y to the tax base so we really do pay tax”. It gets worse when you think about how few people technology companies really employ when compared to more traditional companies (Alphabet employs 130k, Walmart 2.2 million). They have annual profits of 40billion and ~4billion…

I'm sure I just got hit by a not-so-new idea: to tax corporations on profit-per-employee basis. Automation tax, efficiency tax. Imagine the discourse!

Re: Netflix Made Record Profits in 2020, Paid a Tax Rate of Less Than 1 Percent

#87

Post by episteme »

pinky1417 wrote: post #78

One aspect I haven’t seen mentioned in the comments or in the article: double taxation. One of the drawbacks of structuring a business as a c-corp is that you have double taxation: once, at the corporate rate then again at the individual income tax rate if the corporation distributed earnings to shareholders. An advantage of that, however, is that if you’re investing for the future, double taxation can be more effici…

This is always brought up but it isn't double taxation, the individual is paying income tax and that has nothing to do with the corporation tax.

Re: Netflix Made Record Profits in 2020, Paid a Tax Rate of Less Than 1 Percent

#88

Post by varispeed »

dpkrjb wrote: post #59
varispeed wrote: post #12

This is crazy how economy is tilted in favour of these big corporations. If you are a worker, it is not uncommon to pay over 40% of tax and if you work on your own small business you can pay even more and have very little left to reinvest. Then you have progressive tax that is preventing you from saving much - if you want to save for a deposit to buy a house, spend time on education and getting a better job, you'll g…

I remember reading that employment numbers is often a case big Corps make when they warrant dodging tax. “We employe X thousand people who contribute Y to the tax base so we really do pay tax”. It gets worse when you think about how few people technology companies really employ when compared to more traditional companies (Alphabet employs 130k, Walmart 2.2 million). They have annual profits of 40billion and ~4billion…

To add to that - they essentially appropriate taxes workers pay as their own taxes - as if they owned the work that worker put their life into. This is insanely evil.

Re: Netflix Made Record Profits in 2020, Paid a Tax Rate of Less Than 1 Percent

#89

Post by christophilus »

tlholaday wrote: post #11

> Among the mechanisms Netflix is using to achieve its next-to-nothing tax liability are accelerated depreciation (which appears to have cut the company’s tax expense by $148 million); deductions for stock options for Netflix executives and other employees ($339 million); and research and development tax credits ($113 million). These are straightforward deductions.

They are. I’d be pretty upset if I wasn’t able to deduct such expenses from my taxes.

Re: Netflix Made Record Profits in 2020, Paid a Tax Rate of Less Than 1 Percent

#90

Post by sokoloff »

lotsofpulp wrote: post #54
tenaciousDaniel wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yep. I just got an equity payout from an acquisition. It’s a lot of money, though it isn’t going to allow me to retire early. Would be enough for a house down payment, which is good enough for me! However, I am paying literally 40% in taxes due to how it was paid out. As someone who desperately needs this money, it’s devastating. To hear that large corps can weasel their way out of paying is extremely infuriating.

How was it paid out that your federal income tax liability is 40% Or are you talking about withholding? Which is not accurate to describe as “taxes paid”. Also, if including state tax, then it might be higher, but I would still be surprised if your total tax liability was over 40%.

They didn’t claim their federal tax liability was 40%; they claimed they were paying 40% total tax rate on the acquisition-related income, something which is true for most employees in most states for many acquisitions.
Post reply on HN