Republicans talk a big game of fiscal responsibility but when given the chance they do irresponsible things like this and Bush's extensive tax cuts for the wealthy that cost the rest of us billions by running up debt.
Don't forget illegal wars, increased military funding, and raising taxes anyway ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Read_my_lips:_no_new_taxes ).
Trump Tax Plan Said to Call for Lowering Corporate Rate to 15%
51–60 of 82 posts
Re: Trump Tax Plan Said to Call for Lowering Corporate Rate to 15%
#52I am pretty liberal, but I DO think corporate taxes should be lower. We should tax the money that people pull OUT of a business for personal consumption, not the money that is being used to drive the economy.
Personal consumption is the leading 'driver' (or one of them) of the U.S. economy.
I also don't see the distinction: Why shouldn't corporations pay their share, and why should private citizens have to pay more to cover it (taxes are a zero sum game)? Why is a citizen's personal budget somehow of little value, but corporate budgets are sacrosanct? I'm more concerned with protecting private people than corporations.
> corporate taxes should be lower
Lower than what? On what basis do you say they currently are too high (or too low)?
Re: Trump Tax Plan Said to Call for Lowering Corporate Rate to 15%
#53Earlier quoted context omitted.
>You are missing that the reduction should cause some money sitting in coffers outside to flow back in to US. Microsoft, Apple, Goog etc have billions of dollars parked outside the country They won't bring it back if they have to pay 15% on it. We let them bring it back for 5% in 2004 and the result was a net loss to the taxpayer, if I remember correctly. https://www.wsj.com/articles/SB10001424052970203633104576623..…
Had it not happened, the US government would have gotten 0% of the money and their US operations would have been even more cash-starved.
Yes, but the argument is that there would have been no showing of weakness that incentiveized corporations to hoard money for the next round.
Re: Trump Tax Plan Said to Call for Lowering Corporate Rate to 15%
#54Earlier quoted context omitted.
> No corporation with a good tax team pays anything more than 20% of taxes Seems like a good reason to level the playing field, no? We want businesses to succeed by providing better products and services at better prices, not by being extra good at bureaucratic arbitrage.
Okay, but _just_ lowering the top-line number doesn't do anything about that. It just lowers the top-line number. If he was proposing making the top-line number 15% and removing all deductions and credits, then you'd have a more compelling point. Myself, I'm going to wait until a full tax plan comes out before passing judgement one way or another. One number devoid of context tells us nothing.
I mostly agree, but reducing the spread does decrease the handicap a bit.
Re: Trump Tax Plan Said to Call for Lowering Corporate Rate to 15%
#55No corporation with a good tax team pays anything more than 20% of taxes. This idea that 15% is going to really be THE thing that spurns business, well, it might work initially, but the reality is, it will just create more federal debt (think Bush tax cuts of 2003). Also, the current tax codes (loop holes) are too favorable for corps. With the proposed lower corp. base tax rate it will just make it easier for corpora…
> No corporation with a good tax team pays anything more than 20% of taxes.
That's not true. Companies with large domestic brick-and-mortar businesses that account for most of their income often pay a lot more than that. CVS pays about 34%. Costco and Walmart pay about 30%. Most of the tricks with foreign tax havens or intellectual property licensing don't work for their kinds of business.
Re: Trump Tax Plan Said to Call for Lowering Corporate Rate to 15%
#56We don't know about the side effects yet, but a 15% corporate tax would be the starting signal for some entrepreneurial friends of mine to found a company in the USA the second the bill has passed. There is no other big market with such a low corporate tax.
The corporate tax rate here in Canada is 15% for profit up to $500,000, and 25% after that. We also have a lot of rules in place to prevent income from being double taxed, for example if my business pays taxes on $400,000 in profit and I take $150,000 in dividends, I get credit for the 15% in taxes that the business already paid and am only responsible for the other ~15% that I would have owed if I had made all of th…
IIRC, the overall US corporate tax burden is one of the lowest. The idea that it's so hard on corporations is, AFAIK, a talking point of corporate lobbyists. I'm open to any actual evidence, however.
Even "double taxation" is a talking point. Generally, money is taxed when it is transacted between entities: When someone pays a business (income), when you buy something (sales tax), when an employee is paid (personal income), etc. It's not taxed when it sits still. Money is double-, triple-, and in fact infinitely taxed, using the same definition, as it moves around different entities in the economy. The idea that the transaction between a corporation and its owners should be treated differently is very convenient to a select group of people.
Re: Trump Tax Plan Said to Call for Lowering Corporate Rate to 15%
#57To me it's strange how federal law allows local governments to offer tax breaks to individual companies in order to attract them. Conversely, large corporations can play states against each other for the sweetest deal. As a comparison this isn't allowed e.g in the EU and not between regions within most countries. Shouldn't a tax reform close that possibility, which should raise a lot of tax revenue, which could then…
The US Federal government's role isn't to manage all commerce within the states. It's not a matter of what "federal law allows". Managing tax rates within states is not a Federal power enumerated in the Constitution. It's a good thing that States are forced to compete with each other on offering suitable economic environments for the businesses that they wish to attract. Big corporations can offer significant tax rev…
You misunderstood me: I'm not saying the states shouldn't be competing for business.
I'm saying states shouldn't be allowed to give tax breaks to individual companies and not to others. That's effectively having different tax codes for different companies.
It's is analogous to having different laws for different people (which, I assume would not be constitutional).
The point is to create good economic environments without allowing corporations to play states against each other.
Re: Trump Tax Plan Said to Call for Lowering Corporate Rate to 15%
#58Earlier quoted context omitted.
Is there evidence of this? Tax reduction proponents often claim some offsetting benefit, but rarely does it seem to come true. Look up the Laffer Curve from the 1980s, when the Reagan administration claimed that tax cuts would spur economic activity and actually increase tax revenue. Also, to a degree it's based on the premise that these companies are overwhelmed with high taxes and that is determining their behavior…
The evidence is that US corporations are stashing ~$2 trillion dollars offshore. I'm not saying cutting taxes will fix the problem, but it is very apparent that the current tax rate is determining their behavior. Unfortunately it can become a race to the bottom for countries trying to capture the taxes on that income.
> it is very apparent that the current tax rate is determining their behavior
That isn't necessarily true. It could be due to other laws, such as the one that allows them to stash money overseas tax-free. Perhaps that's the law that should change.
Re: Trump Tax Plan Said to Call for Lowering Corporate Rate to 15%
#59This would be much more in-line with the world average.
Re: Trump Tax Plan Said to Call for Lowering Corporate Rate to 15%
#60Earlier quoted context omitted.
Is there evidence of this? Tax reduction proponents often claim some offsetting benefit, but rarely does it seem to come true. Look up the Laffer Curve from the 1980s, when the Reagan administration claimed that tax cuts would spur economic activity and actually increase tax revenue. Also, to a degree it's based on the premise that these companies are overwhelmed with high taxes and that is determining their behavior…
But income tax revenue grew robustly over the 1980's: https://www.thebalance.com/current-u-s-federal-government-ta...
Thanks. The gross numbers depend on far more than tax policy; I'm not sure how meaningful they are. The economy tends to grow no matter what the policy, and remember that the US was coming out of what was, at that time, the worst recession since WWII. That said, I don't have evidence at my fingertips.
(Also, I'm not sure what to think of that website: Their anti-government bias seems to show through and their understanding of economics is poor. For example, the following fails basic microeconomics and pricing: the entire U.S. tax burden really falls on individuals. That's because corporations pass on their tax burden to families in the form of higher prices or lower wages. / Corporations must maintain their profit margin to satisfy stockholders, so they pass on any additional corporate taxes to consumers or workers. If only my company could just set whatever price and wages it wanted, and consumers and workers continued to buy and hire on at the same rate!)