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Some voters are sick of companies like Amazon paying no corporate tax

nytimes.com

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Re: Some voters are sick of companies like Amazon paying no corporate tax

#31

Post by TomMarius »

TheBobinator wrote: post #27
seunosewa wrote: post #5

The article is reluctant to mention the reason why they got those tax rebates, and focuses on the way people feel about it. This seems like bad journalism. According to CNBC, “Amazon's low tax bill mainly stemmed from the Republican tax cuts of 2017, carryforward losses from years when the company was not profitable, tax credits for massive investments in R&D and stock-based employee compensation.” https://www.cnbc.c…

Go look at Amazon's 8k and 10k filings; If memory serves it wasn't until 2015 or 2016 they turned a profit after almost 2 decades. It's been illegal, under racketeering laws, to sell at a loss in order to capture a market for a long, long time, and that's the real story here. Republicans and Democrats have let that one go; blaming political parties is a straw-man argument. They expect to utter the words and hope you…

Not turning a profit does not mean or even imply selling at loss at all.

Re: Some voters are sick of companies like Amazon paying no corporate tax

#32

Post by kgwgk »

cies wrote: post #24
kgwgk wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One could argue that consumers are the ones paying every tax.

Sure. But what is taxed does steer society. Imagine only taxing on pollution (so not on wages/sales/home ownership). Currently we tax on wages/ sales/ home ownership and not on Amazon an little on pollution. Look around to see the result.

I don't get your point. Are you suggesting that Amazon alone should pay a tax on revenue (steering business to its competitors and reducing consumption slightly), that every company should pay a tax on revenue (steering business from more expensive and less vertically-integreated competitors to Amazon, but reducing overall consumption) or something else entirely?

Re: Some voters are sick of companies like Amazon paying no corporate tax

#34

Post by locklock »

lfcc wrote: post #26
civilitty wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Those all sound like corporate tax policies. That's literally what they're talking about. Clearly, a growing portion of the electorate doesn't like those policies. That's the first step in democracy, no? Engagement?

I agree that engagement and discussing policies is important. But it does feel disingenuous and aimed at provoking outrage (to trigger a knee-jerk reaction) when you just mention a fact like "look at these rich guys that don't share anything!" and ignore the context of why it got to be the way it is. And I'm not saying that there aren't changes that could and should be made. Just that this particular article doesn't…

I'm fine with outrage-inducing propaganda against people who have tens or hundreds of billions of dollars since that class as a whole spends so much time putting out propaganda in their favor. I'm not particularly interested in the details as long as it elevates consciousness about the inherent problems with a society that allows Jeff Bezos to have more money than he could spend in ten thousand lifetimes while millions of people aren't entirely sure how they're going to afford food next week

Re: Some voters are sick of companies like Amazon paying no corporate tax

#35

Post by TomMarius »

rocgf wrote: post #28
bdibs wrote: post #14

Voters are sick of it because of a general misunderstanding of corporate taxes, and sensationalized headlines are just making it worse.

I must admit that my knowledge is lacking in this area. Can someone offer a high-level explanation to one of the people who don't understand corporate taxes in the US? As far as my understanding goes, the bulk of taxes are paid on profit (to be more precise, operating income), and not revenue. As far as I understand, big companies do everything possible to make it seem like they are not profitable from an accounting…

You're missing that Amazon is reinvesting, not hiding profit.

Re: Some voters are sick of companies like Amazon paying no corporate tax

#36

Post by daemin »

grenoire wrote: post #3

Really have to start taxing over revenues. It's long due.

Initially I too thought this was a bad idea, but if you think about it and set the tax rate really low - like a handful of percent, say 1% or 2%, not more than 5% - it might actually work.

Because even if the corporate tax rate is 30%, but we only collect it on profit, which ends up being only 5%-10% of revenue. So in actual fact, if the corporation was honest, we're really only collecting 30% of 5% or so, which is about 1-2% of revenue.

The thing which I think works with this "revenue tax" is that it removes the ability of the corporation to do clever accounting tricks to reduce the amount of profit. For example moving the IP offshore to a lower taxed country. It is something that could work for a lot of countries and would satisfy a lot of people.

The one place where it might not work is where margins are already razor thin and the business makes up on volume. But then again the business would have to charge more to cover the extra expense.

Re: Some voters are sick of companies like Amazon paying no corporate tax

#37

Post by lugg »

bedhead wrote: post #23

The intellectual dishonesty of this from allegedly smart people continues to astound me. Amazon has little-to-no taxes mainly because they have such low taxable income in the first place because they spend so much in R&D and other things. They’re actually creating jobs and new businesses rather than showing massive profits and paying a ton in taxes. I have no doubt they take advantage of perfectly legal tax code item…

> take advantage of perfectly legal tax code items

Nobody is saying otherwise. They are saying these legal loopholes are the problem that need changing.

Re: Some voters are sick of companies like Amazon paying no corporate tax

#38

Post by lmm »

movax wrote: post #11

Am I to believe Bezos and his investors will simply take the hit of paying taxes, or will that expense get passed to consumers?

Smaller companies pay their taxes and set their prices at a level where they can afford that. If Amazon are forced to compete fairly on efficiency/quality/... rather than on tax avoidance, that's a good thing for customers in the long run (and of course collecting tax to be spent on public services is good for citizens immediately).

Re: Some voters are sick of companies like Amazon paying no corporate tax

#39

Post by crispyambulance »

acslater00 wrote: post #21

It doesn’t matter if corporations pay taxes because the money just flows to people who own equity in or work for those corporations, and they pay taxes.

It would be OK if corporations didn't pay taxes.

BUT there's more to the story.

Not only do they not pay taxes, they also enjoy absurd political power through lobbyists and through being able to pump huge sums of money into politics thanks to the Citizen's United decision.

There is simply too much power in the hands of the corporations. I mean, Amazon literally had dozens of city governments falling over themselves to give up enormous tax goodies and red carpet roll out all for the weak promise of 50000 jobs and an HQ2.

Re: Some voters are sick of companies like Amazon paying no corporate tax

#40

Post by lfcc »

locklock wrote: post #34
lfcc wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree that engagement and discussing policies is important. But it does feel disingenuous and aimed at provoking outrage (to trigger a knee-jerk reaction) when you just mention a fact like "look at these rich guys that don't share anything!" and ignore the context of why it got to be the way it is. And I'm not saying that there aren't changes that could and should be made. Just that this particular article doesn't…

I'm fine with outrage-inducing propaganda against people who have tens or hundreds of billions of dollars since that class as a whole spends so much time putting out propaganda in their favor. I'm not particularly interested in the details as long as it elevates consciousness about the inherent problems with a society that allows Jeff Bezos to have more money than he could spend in ten thousand lifetimes while millio…

Amazon is not Jeff Bezos. Taxing him would be a whole different topic of conversation. Probably more on the topics of executive compensation, taxes for high incomes, and a bunch of other possible subjects.

Interesting discussion to be had, for sure, but not what the article is really about.

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