Should we eliminate corporate taxes?

[TheFarseer]

Hold on, don't flame me yet. Hear me out. Repukes like to say you can't tax corporations because that's where all the jobs come from. OK, I might buy that. If you don't tax corporations, then they might expand and provide more jobs. Meanwhile raise taxes on rich people. This would discourage ridiculously high salaries for CEOs and keep more money in the company for job creation etc. Contrary to another republican argument, rich people do not create jobs - only the companies they own. Unless you count illegal alien gardeners and nannies as jobs we want created. So tax the balls of rich people, but not their companies. Thoughts?

[Occulus]

1. we should eliminate corporate personhood, not corporate taxes n/t

[ET Awful]

2. Bingo. Exactly what I was going to say. :) n/t

[Deja Q]

11. I second that. The filthy money devourers lost their souls.

They're not fit to be in charge of humans. For they themselves are not human.

[Egalitariat]

30. I see that alot here. What does that mean?****

nm

[Az]

36. Going to assume you are asking about corporate identity

Federal laws treat corporations as if they were an individual seperate from the people that make up the company. This means they have rights and responsibilities similar to an individual. They must pay taxes and they have freedoms similar to a person.

The problem with this is corporations are not people. Treated as people they wind up having so much more power than we do that we become second class citizens compared to them.

The real issue is that corporations have different drives than people do. We have a host of drives that make us what we are. We have social needs as well as biological needs. The only need a corporation has is to make money. Socially speaking corporations are sociopaths. And given the rights of people they can exact a great toll on our society.

[Just Me]

39. Corporations were granted the privilege of "personhood",...

,...the right to sue and be sued and have the same rights and protections as any citizen. There is some question as to whether the Court actually intended to grant this privilege,...but, that is another story.

Since the time that corporations have been granted such privilege, an overwhelming number of laws have been created to give corporations greater protections and fewer liabilities. Hence, corporations now hold a far greater status than the privilege of a citizen.

There is at least one book on this, lots of links, too. I don't have them off-hand but their are several members of this forum who could contribute that information.

[Occulus]

60. The SCOTUS of the time wanted to do this.

That much is clear from a reading of their own statements in one particular case, Santa Clara Cty. v. Southern Pacific Railroad Co. In the headnotes for the case, the SCOTUS rendered the opinion that corporations were persons simply by the expedient of declaring it so:

"One of the points made and discussed at length in the brief of counsel for defendants in error was that "Corporations are persons within the meaning of the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States." Before argument

MR. CHIEF JUSTICE WAITE said: The court does not wish to hear argument on the question whether the provision in the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution, which forbids a State to deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws, applies to these corporations. We are all of opinion that it does."

http://reclaimdemocracy.org/personhood/santa_clara_vs_southern_pacific.html

You can also look here:

http://reclaimdemocracy.org/personhood/

[Just Me]

3. I think those who believe in the "good will" of a corporation,...

,...are foolish and naive. Corporations seek profits and have no compulsion to contribute to societies. Corporate structure is used to protect unethical, predatory profit-seekers from prosecution for breaking laws or conspiring to break them. Corporate structure wildly advances economic inequality.

Since corporations have already proved a pattern of abuse in a number of ways, we should either take away the personhood protections (they should never have received) or impose at least as many limits on their behavior as we do the behavior of a common citizen. Moreover, they should be fairly taxed because they are huge organisms that would not have the privilege of their existence without this nation.

[AP]

31. After the depression, many corporations made an effort to be good citizens

Banks and retailers, and manufacturers in small towns across America started company symphony orchestras and participated in the life of their community. They had to because people were so suspicious of their motivations.

Since the 70s, that's all changed. Now they're only interested in profits (part of the reason is because there's so much money for corporate insiders to be made from stock options so long as they can report on their SEC filings that the company's profits increased).

[MichiganVote]

4. We pretty much have eliminated taxes for corporate America

[Nikia]

5. No

A coporation has no obligation to create jobs with the money they saved. Even if the corporation has more money, they will not create jobs or expand unless there is demand. If there is not increased demand, they will not create jobs.

[TheFarseer]

6. That is an excellent point about demand

but (assuming we can close loopholes) what will they do with all the money they save if it is discouraged from giving it out to waelthy stakeholders by high taxes? If there is no demand in their industry, perhaps they can invest it in another industry where there is demand and expansion. Honestly though, the more I think about this, the more I'm convinced it would never work in the real world because of corruption and loopholes. It's too bad everything has to be like that.

[AP]

35. They'll use the money to buy off legislators so that they won't tax divi-

dends and cap gains.

By taxing earned income but not corporate income, you'll create and imbalance of political and economic power that will ensure that we won't tax rich people's money at higher rates.

In other words it is a logically inconstent to say, "let's not tax corporations at all, but tax rich people at higher rates."

Doing the former will ensure that corporate PACs have so much power that they'll make sure you aren't able to do the latter.

The best thing to do is to spread the tax burden fairly and equitably everywhere money changes hands, whether from buyer to corporate seller, employer to employee, or deceased to heir.

If you decide that one of those transfers won't be taxed, more and more money will change hands between those two people (and less and less will flow through taxed streams) and the recipient of the untaxed money will become the politically powerful entity in America, and will force changes in other laws that will guarantee they get wealthier.

[Deja Q]

12. Remind us of that when your job gets offshored.

M'kay?

[Nikia]

16. That's another point too

Even if they do choose to expand, they have no obligation to expand in the U.S.

[TreasonousBastard]

7. There is a serious theory in economics...

that says corporations shouldn't be taxed at all because taxes inhibit their growth by taking money away from better investments. When they grow, they create jobs and other tax revenues.

As with many economic theories, particularly those that come out of Chicago, most of the evidence seems to prove otherwise.

[RC]

8. When corporations do not pay their fair share in taxes,

they us use that money to over pay their corporate mangers, inflate the value of their own stock and the most damanging, buy out the competition.

[TheFarseer]

26. I was just thinking, when corporations expand........

they can just write off the costs of expanding. That would make the entire republican argument really stupid.

[OneBlueSky]

9. corporations have no interest in creating jobs . . .

in fact, it's just the opposite . . . employees are a major corporate expense that they would just as soon reduce whenever possible . . . any savings accrued by eliminating the corporate tax would most assuredly go to the stockholders and to the CEO and other corporate executives . . .

what we really need to do is eliminate corporate personhood, make it illegal to be incorporated in the US and transfer operations offshore to avoid taxes, and re-regulate industry . . .

[Deja Q]

13. Bingo. It's about savings and CEO bonuses/retirement packages only. We are

We are merely commodities to them. Disposable ones. Throwaway ones. We are nothing to them. People need to remember that.

[B Calm]

10. If anything we need to create a Wealth Tax as a recovery

mechanism for all the benefits large businesses received at the expense of 99% of the population and for protection services provided by the US government... judgment day!

[Stinky The Clown]

14. Actually, there's some merit to this

Just by way of intro, there is already a subset of a corporation called a sub-chapter S, or S-Corp. Essentially, it gives the company a corporate veil - personhood, if you will - but passes all monies through to the stockholders, who are then personally liable for the taxes.

The notion of eliminating all corporate tax has some merit. Raise dramatically the tax rate on high income 'earners' (I love that word .... I also love irony) and make the scale such that the rate it would return to the government is what it would have been from corporate taxes were the company to have paid all it owed.

Then, to encourage investment, reduce the tax rate on shareholder income in a way that favors (dramatically so) small investors. At the same time, raise dramatically the rate on shareholder income for large investors. In other words, make the benefit of profit go to the (many many) little guy at a rate higher than it goes to the (few) big investors.

Screw around with the capital gains tax in a similar fashion.

[AP]

25. An S-corp is limited in size, organization, and can't sell shares, so...

...it is more like a partnership.

The danger in eliminating corporate taxes is that large corporations that do sell shares will become to tax free entities.

And your solution of raising taxes on high levels of incomes would never capture the large corporation's untaxed earnings because the corporation wouldn't pass on its wealth to employees through wages.

They'll pass it out as dividend income taxed at 15%, and they'll pass it out by using their untaxed revenue to push up share prices, which insiders will sell, and which would be taxed at long or short term cap gains rates, which would still be much lower than the earned income tax rate for the income bracket they'd be in if the money were income.

Furthermore, it's the desire to reduce taxable income by deducting salaries from earnings that encourages corporations to pay decent wages (and Christmas bonuses). If they didn't have that incentive, you're going to see large corporations pay lower wages, which screws people who work for a living.

401(k) matching by corporations is encouraged through tax deductions for the corporation. Would they do that if they had no need to lower their tax? Probably not.

The bottom line: if you don't tax corporations (while taxing everyone else) you're just going to turn corporations into vehicles for concentrating huge amounts of wealth in the hands of a very few people to an even greater degree than they are now, and they'll give nothing back to the government in exchange for being given legislative treatment that allows them to make so much more money than anyone else in society.

[Stinky The Clown]

32. I'm not suggesting the S-corp is the way to go

I just held it out as an example.

The **concept** is to eliminate taxes on corps of all manner and shift the taxes to the shareholders *as individuals*. The rates can be set at whatever is best *for the country*.

It is a concept ... not a formal proposal.

The rest are arcane details. The details only matter when the concept is agreed to.

[AP]

44. Any proposal not to tax any entity or transfer of money is a way to

ensure that that entity or the recipient of that transfer becomes the most politically powerful entity in society.

Once you do that, that entity will use its power to ensure that no money they pass on to insiders is ever taxed.

Here's the example: Monarchy. The core principle of monarchy is tax free transfer of wealth at death. Monarchy is accumulated power that you pass on to your heirs without your heirs having to see any of it reduced.

What happens when you allow that? You create more and more power for monarchs, while other people who have to pay taxes on their wealth never catch up and can never compete. What do monarchs do with that power? They ensure, through legislation, that their power is even more guaranteed while others will never be able to challenge it.

Engaging in "economic royalism" (FDR's phrase for American capitalism pre-New Deal) is not a good idea. The consequences are obvious -- he have centuries of history showing us what they'd be: corporations would buy themselves a political environment in which tax on cap gains, dividends and income would barely touch the wealth they pass on to insiders.

[Just Me]

51. That's why corp should be treated no differently than proprietorships.

I mean, face it, we no longer live in a country where the so-called "corporate veil" is EVER pierced,...well, it's rarely pierced and when it is pierced the sentence waged is comparatively small to proprietorships.

I just think the "corporation" has been granted too many privileges and protections and has evolved into a vehicle for wielding too much power over people. So, let's just slowly rid ourselves of that organism called "corporation".

I'm sure such a suggestion raises the hair on every corporacrats' skin.

[AP]

56. If the only option were a proprietorship, a lot of good people would not

accept the risks of engaging in some socially-valuable, high-risk activities, and we'd all be poorer because of it.

Yes, corporations have too many privileges, but a lot of it has to do with size (and with how little we tax the super larg corps relative to small corps).

A lot of it has to do with the crappy state of corporate governance (shareholders should have more control over a corp, and there should be better rules for preventing board members with conflicts of interests from serving, etc.) and with the reliability of the public audit, and stuff like that.

But the essence of corporations law -- limited liability, for example -- is extremely wise a socially beneficial, I believe.

[Just Me]

61. I agree.

Limited liability is the incentive for people to take the risks necessary to expand and grow.

Perhaps, a better way of expressing my view is the proposition that we slowly destroy all that which has corrupted corporatehood: the excessive privileges and protections. There are insufficent leashes (laws) and restrictions on corporate abuse. Those that exist are inadequately enforced.

Moreover, we should encourage responsible corporate behavior via greater incentives, including the incentive of serious deterrents for reckless corporate endeavor.

[Stinky The Clown]

66. I'm following this conversation

... and while slightly off the OP's topic, I see it as important ... and maaaaaaybe even related to the OP's point.

The corporate veil and corporate responsibility ......

I agree with AP's posit that the corporate veil isn't such a bad thing, at least in concept. For example, looking at it on a more personal level ..... for a smaller corporation. Let's say business goes south, but not due to any malfeasance on the part of the owners or the executives .... they simply had a bad year for whatever reason ... bad market, whatever. I would be very much opposed to the shareholders and executives having to, say, sell their houses to pay the company debt.

On the flip side, if a corporation executive is slippery and slimy, that corporate veil should come down in a heartbeat. Technically, even now, it can. But all too often it doesn't.

And there are far too many loopholes. I think AP hit the bullseye when she said that large corporations get away with a boatload more than the little guys who set up their lawn care business as a corporation are able to.

I have to confess .... I am one of three partners in a LLC (not unlike a corporation). We do less than a half million a year in total sales volume. We're, truly, small potatoes. Other than protecting my personal assets from seizure for debt, and assuming I do nothing wrong, that's all it does for me. We (my partners and I) live our lives very much like any other wage earners. We manage to save a few (very few) bucks each year, but we're pretty much paycheck-to-paycheck like anyone else. We even have to pay for our health insurance out of our pockets because the 'corporate veil' we have, and the tax laws, won't allow owners like us to get such a perk ... it is taxed as income.

[Just Me]

71. I have also been a small business operator,...

,...in the past, and have known many small business owners. We ALL are quite aware of the fact that the big guys definitely receive far more privileges and protections than the little guys.

The way the system is set up right now, the value of real competition is pretty much squashed because there is NO fair market. A fair market requires rules and laws that protect the little guys and restrain abuse by the big guys. Of course, the big guys are in charge and write the rules.

I don't want to advocate destruction of limited liability. On the other hand, it is way so blatantly clear that checks and balances, rules and laws certainly are necessary in a healthy capitalistic democracy. Otherwise, democracy dies at the hands of corporatism.

[Stinky The Clown]

75. I agree ..... I'm a practitioner more than a businessman ......

Once I get past the concept stages, I lose interest. Money, economics, and law bore me and I feel sometimes almost 'ADD' about it all. I know right from wrong. I love to compete. I love to be successful. I love to contemplate ethics. I know rules are needed. I know competition is, at this point, very much unfair.

I don't have any detailed answers ...... but I *do* know that we Dems always come up short in ths debate. I'd love for us to find a way to be seen as being much more pro-business, but in a way that fully squares with our social, humanist instincts.

[aion]

79. What definition of Monarchy are you using?

1 : undivided rule or absolute sovereignty by a single person
2 : a nation or state having a monarchical government
3 : a government having an hereditary chief of state with life tenure and powers varying from nominal to absolute


I see absolutely nothing in those definitions which indicate the process of taxation of any sort, including death/inheritance taxes.

[AP]

86. People who inherit wealth rather than work for it. If we got rid of inher-

itance tax, we'd create defacto royality (inherited privlege) which would come from making a lot of money just by virtue of who your parents are.

The point is that avenues of wealth transfer that go untaxed end up becoming very powerful as more and more many pass that way.

It's like a law of physics: water travelling downhill takes the path of least resistance.

If you tax income at 39% and dividends at 15% and inheritance not at all, you're going ensure that for powerful people who can arrange the way they get money will shift the way they get money from working to dividends, but even better, to inheritance. Tax revenues will decrease and socially unproductive activities will be rewarded with the greatest economic (and therefore cultural and political) power.

Do you want to be ruled by a nation of Rockefeller, Gates, and Bush Jrs? Do you want to be inundated by media that tells you that that's a great thing?

[AP]

15. The effective rate of taxation on corporations is 2-3% according to IRS.

We practically don't tax them now. Of course they have to engage in some socially productive behavior to write off so much income, like PAY WAGES, which they'd do less of if they didn't need the tax benefit. But, for all intents and purposes, they barely pay tax now.

Anytime we chose not to tax some avenue through which money passes from one hand to another, we create a path of least resistance through which more and more money flows, which deprives other, taxed chanels a flow of money which then generates tax revenues.

We don't tax inheritance? Guess what? Rich people will marry rich people and more and more money will never be taxed even once, shifting the tax burden on to people who can't shelter their income by marrrying and inheriting.

We don't tax corporate income? Guess what? More and more activity will be carried on as corporate activity (rather than as a partnership or as employees) and then it will passed out to individuals either through dividends taxed at 15% or all that corporate money will be reported in SEC filings to convince people that the company's shares should be worth more, and then people who make money selling the company's shares will get rich (and that wealth will be taxed as Cap Gains taxed at 15%).

Meanwhile, the only people paying more than 15% tax on the wealth they accumulate will be people who work for a living, and less and less money will be taxed as earned income (even though a greater percentage of tax revenues will come from it) because those people will be burdened so much while others aren't that they'll lose their political power, and their wages through, for example, union-busting and other anti-employee legislation, will be held down so that capital makes money off workers' cheap labor.

And guess what? that's exactly what has happened. It used to be that 2/3rds of all tax revenue came from corporate taxes. Now 2/3rd comes from taxes on earned income from work. Corporations have all the political power. Workers are getting screwed.

If you want to take that last 2-3% away and remove one of biggest incentives to pay decent wages (the deductibility of wages from corporate income) you might tip the balance to fascism to such a degree that it would be almost impossible to untip the balance through the political process.

[Stinky The Clown]

23. I don't think the OP and you are apart at all

The OP said "Meanwhile raise taxes on rich people". A broad brush statement, but surely an indication of sentiment and, yes, the underlying concept in his suggestion to eliminate corporate tax.

Once we can agre to the concept - and I'm suggesting, you, the OP, and me do - then the rest is details.

At least that's how I read it.

[AP]

28. Read my response to your post above. I'm very far apart from the OP.

Raise what taxes on rich people? Taxes on earned income? There won't be any income there to capture.

If you raise dividend and cap gainst taxes, then the corporations will just hold on to their money and figure out ways to pass it on that aren't taxed. Everyone will get a company car and a company house and company vacations and company expense accounts, and company season tickets. And if you then decide that you want to figure out ways to tax those things, then you'll wonder why you aren't simplifying your life by just taxing corporate income.

And don't forget all the things that corporations do in order to reduce taxes: pay salaries, match 401ks, R&D. Will they do those things if they can make a lot of money just by not paying taxes?

[Stinky The Clown]

33. "....... simplifying your life by just taxing corporate income."

One way or another you have to account for that stuff.

If the corporation pays for this, then they have to report it. Whether they get taxed on it or the beneficiary gets taxed on it.

[AP]

37. Read post 35.

If they had to report it, then they'd take two years out, not pay anything, accumulate wealth, put it into their corporate PACs and buy off legislators who will give them low cap gains and dividend taxes, and make corporate houses, cars and other perqs aren't considered income.

How do you think we got 15% tax rates on dividencs and LTGC and why do you think stock options aren't included as expenses? It has a lot to do with the fact that corporations have seen their tax burdens dramatically decreased relative to the tax burdens of the average worker and consumer.

[Stinky The Clown]

58. AP .... I honestly believe we're both looking for the same result

which would be to have corporations:

a) Pay a fair share of the country's income needs.

b) Lose the overpowering influence they now wield on our country.

You make powerful (and largely spot on) technical arguments to maintain (and perhaps increase) corporate taxation. I'm not arguing with any of it. In fact, the OP simply asked for thoughts. And thoughts (not proposals or plans) are what I rendered.

But here's what occurs to me .......

We've been steadily losing this battle in the court of public opinion. Even as any thinking individual would largely be in agreement with our ideas and, absolutely in agreement with our concept (corporations need to lose some influence and pay for that part of the common weal they so readily use), we continue to lose.

I suspect this is because we posit everything in an 'us vs them' construct.

I absolutely want to preserve our concept (corporations need to lose some influence and pay for that part of the common weal they so readily use), but I would like to consider ways in which we can do that *and* not appear to be so antagonistic. And I think that's possible. And I think that starting with a clean sheet of paper and rethinking the whole magilla could get us there.

Sure we need to never lose sight of lessons learned in the past (your monarchy discussion, for example). But I also think we're smart enough to re craft the whole thing in a way that puts us in a far, far better light and *still* gets us where we need to get to.

And so that's why I said this idea has merit. Not to be pro-corporate (not that I'm absolutely anti-corporate either), but to be pro-country. And in an ideal America, we find ways where everyone is the better for our work, even when some (like the very wealthy, the top 1%-ers, for example) have to pay more for that.

So again, while we can discuss all the arcane stuff we want to, I'd rather look for a strategic way forward that gets us into the best place possible ... for the people, for the country, and, yes, for the democrats and their friends.

Once we (the party, not you and me) agree that this (or any other) *broad concept* is where we want to be, then its time to start on the arcane, the minutia, the details .......

[AP]

77. In my opinion, the solution to that problem is to align the interests of

small business people with individuals, since their interests are exactly the same.

As I said above, the problem isn't with the concept of the corporation. It has to do with the power differentials between large corps and small corps, large corps and consumers, and large corps and employees.

Arguing that corporations shouldn't get taxed as an effort to avoid an "us vs them" mentality is going to produce a very powerless "us" and a very very powerful "them."

[Stinky The Clown]

83. And from that statement, we move again to the basics ......

how to forge that natural alliance between small corporations and and individuals, but in a way that doesn't hold us out as being anti-business. Many small corporations have designs, if not the wherewithal, on being big someday. We can't alienate them. While they're truly small and destined to stay that way, that is out of synch with their self-view.

The framing has to be extraordinarily artful.

[AP]

84. Not to sound arrogant, but I think I've laid out the way to do that in...

...my responses here.

Many small corps have designs on being big and want a level playing field on which to do that. They don't want unfair tax laws that they know will prevent them from ever becoming big.

[Stinky The Clown]

87. Well, it is surely a start .....

.... and we've found that we have much in the way of common ground. I don't know that I fully agree with everything you've said, but I **know** I agree with most of it.

But that's not really a concern. If (using just you and me as an example) we can agree as much as we do (and for argument sake, let's say that is 95% ... maybe 98%) we're well on the road to finding a proper frame for the concept.

In my view, it is that frame that is critical. That frame is what will allow our views to be considered on the broader stage of public opinion.

Thanks for being so thoughtful. :hi:

[AP]

78. In my opinion, the solution to that problem is to align the interests of

small business people with individuals, since their interests are exactly the same.

As I said above, the problem isn't with the concept of the corporation. It has to do with the power differentials between large corps and small corps, large corps and consumers, and large corps and employees.

Arguing that corporations shouldn't get taxed as an effort to avoid an "us vs them" mentality is going to produce a very powerless "us" and a very very powerful "them."

[TheFarseer]

41. Yes, this is loophole plagued

I was going for more a basic idea than an entire economic plan. I wish all income was taxed on the same scale (i.e. no special rates for dividents etc) I keep telling people that no corporations are taxed into losing money. You are only taxed on profits. If you lost money last year, there is no possible way you can blame the government. You've only got yourself to blame. One thing I will challenge you on - you are saying that corporations basically pay no taxes but high taxes are one of the reasons they give for moving off shore. Are you saying this argument is complete garbage? I'm not willing to go that far.

[AP]

50. I don't agree that all transfers of money should be taxed at the same rate

I definitely think income from work should be taxed at the lowest rates for most tax bands.

I think cap gains should be taxed in a way that encoruages small business entrepreneurialism and that doesn't give super large businesses competitive advantages beyond size alone. (Ie, I think it's OK that a super-large business can get a competitive advantage from being able to negotiate volume discounts from suppliers, but I don't think they should get a regressive tax advantage on top of that).

I think dividends are great for small shareholders, but are a huge, unfair tax break for super rich people, so they should obviously be taxed progressively according to the recipient's income, rather than flat taxed at 15%. (Remember, Theresa Heinz paid aboutu 14% tax in 2003 because she doesn't work for a living, all her income probably comes from LTCG and dividends, and because she had some charitable deductions -- meanwhile your average employed person is paying twice the effective rate -- that's wrong.)

I think inheritance should be taxed progressively according to the recipient's income (at lower rates than earned income for low income earners, but probably at higher rates than earned income for super wealthy people).

I think taxing all income at the same rates would be a really bad idea. Using the tax code to encourage valuable activity (like working) is a good idea.

To answer your question, reread my post: they're taxed in a way that encourages them to engage in activity that allows them to reduce their taxable income, like paying salaries and matching 401ks, which they do. Obviously, they would prefer to move to lower-tax jurisdictions so they don't have to engage in any activity other than increasing the profits they pass on to insiders.

[ckramer]

17. We should eliminate corporate taxes if workers are paid a decent

living wage and enjoy quality national health care and housing.

Eliminating IRS can also save a bunch too.

[MsTryska]

18. are you smoking crack?!

ok jsut kidding.


seriously tho - hell no don't eliminate corporate taxes.


eliminate corporate personhood as stated above, and tax corporations at a full rate, with no loopholes, allowed.


from there - provide tax incentives and cuts for what Corporations do right.

if you minimize your pollution output - you get a tax break. Keep your headquarters in the US you get a taxbreak, export more than you import - tax break - only have offshore operations to support your offshore interests, taxbreak, etc, etc..

[BiggJawn]

19. WHAT "Corporate Taxes"?

Corporations pay taxes? That's news to me. I heard that big Corpos get refunds on the ammount of taxes they MIGHT have paid if their GOP buddies hadn't given them so many loopholes in the first place.

"Here ya go, 55 megabux, your tax refund"
"But I didn't PAY any taxes!"
"Doesn't matter, you WOULD have had to pay, so you're still entitled to a refund!"

They need to revoke "Legal Personhood" for corporations. That's a joke, because a corporation has more rights and immunity from litgation/prosecution than a flesh-and-blood person anyway...

[Doctor_J]

22. No shit

they don't pat taxes, yet they have all the rights of citizens and more. That's a BIG reason wer're i nthe financial mess we're in.

[barb162]

20. no way

[mhr]

21. Corporations Should Be Taxed For The Same Reason That People Are

Corporations could not exist without the supporting infrastructure that enables society in general:

- our courts
- our clean water
- our clean air
- our roads
- our monetary system
- our public education system
- our health care system
- our public utility system
- etc.

Just like people, the corporations rely on all of these elements to conduct their business. Without them they will not function.

Thus, if the corporations rely on public infrastructure then they should pay to support that infrastructure through taxes.

[lonestarnot]

24. Fatal flaw in your argument is that don't even resemble a human either....

just machines of mass consumption of our flesh!

[Lydia Leftcoast]

27. Do you KNOW how corporations are taxed?

Most people don't. That's why the Republicanites can get away with their "don't tax corporations" bullshit. Most people, if they think about it at all, assume that corporations are taxed the same way people are, on all the money that comes into them, and that like a person, paying x number of dollars in taxes cuts into what you have to buy the necessities.

Not true.

Corporations are taxed on what's left over AFTER they've paid their workers, bought supplies and equipment, heated their buildings, upgraded their equipment, conducted research, entertained clients, insured their property, advertised their product, and everything else that can be even remotely interpreted as a legitimate business expense.

Imagine if people had to pay taxes only on what's left over after they bought their food, clothing, shelter, and other necessities of life (which the personal deduction doesn't come close to covering, of course). That's the position corporations are in.

A corporation can actually reduce its taxes by hiring more people, building new plants and offices, and conducting research and development.

All corporate income taxes do is potentially reduce the dividends that shareholders may receive.

[lonestarnot]

34. Are you educating or defending?

[Lydia Leftcoast]

40. Both

I'm educating people AND defending the idea of corporate income taxes, because I've found that most people indeed do not know these things.

I didn't until I went into business for myself. (By the way, I'm not a corporation, but a sole proprietor, and I still get one of the advantages of a corporation, namely, being able to deduct all legitimate business expenses on Schedule C before my "profits" go onto my 1040 form.)

[lonestarnot]

45. This may be ok for small business, but large corps. have no business

with the deals they get and then to top it off illegal slave labor.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

48. I'm sorry, I don't understand what you just wrote there

:shrug:

You seem to have left out some connections.

[lonestarnot]

52. We are talking about corporate taxes? I thought you wanted corps not

to be taxed and if this is not what you are in favor of, then disregard the rest of this post. But I think that corps have way to many breaks and are destroying the world. The richies at the top are inhumane and could give a shit about anything but golden parachutes. So I am not in favor of NOT taxing corps. They should be taxed more with the exception of businesses like small enterprises, those with profits under a certain amount. Large corps don't give a shit about people or the environment. They hire slave laborers, hundreds of thousands, not even legal citizens. And you are suggesting that we end taxing them? Not! Not in favor!

[Lydia Leftcoast]

55. Then we agree

The Republican Talking Point is that taxes harm corporations. I was arguing that taxes actually encourage corporations to make beneficial investments (hiring people, building plants, researching new products) to avoid taxes.

[lonestarnot]

92. Cool

[TheFarseer]

49. Yes, I know how corporations are taxed

It's funny how you can know all the facts and never put two and two together. Yes - companies can lower their taxes by hiring more people. I'm glad I posted this. It's been good discussion and I think some people have learned from this. I'm still struggling to understand how we can compete with outsourcing to countries that have NO taxes and still keep a tax incentives to open more plants and hire more people as you described. I think this whole tax thing might be moot because expanding is driven by demand rather than saving a bit of change on taxes.

[HamdenRice]

29. The progressive position should be: Eliminate ALL corporate taxes!

I strongly believe that all corporate taxes should be eliminated, and moreover, that this is the most progressive position to take on taxation.

We should eliminate all corporate income taxes (except certain user fee type taxes, and of course property taxes on corporate owned real estate) not because it will generate more jobs or investment, but because taxation would be more progressive if we did. In fact, there was a big debate about this in the early 1980s, and the most left leaning tax specialists favored eliminating corporate taxes, while, believe it or not, corporations lobbied Congress heavily to retain the corporate tax.

Basically, corporations are not real people -- they represent the interests of various stakeholders: shareholders, management, employees, contractors, etc. Corporations really are an illusion.

When you tax corporate income, you are really taxing the shareholders. But the shareholders are in different income brackets. Some shareholders should pay no income taxes: non-profit universities and foundations with corporate share endowments, workers with 401Ks and IRAs, and so forth. Some shareholders should pay very high taxes in a truly progressive system: rich people, mainly. But the corporate income tax taxes all these shareholders the same.

We should replace the corporate tax with a very steep progressive tax on personal income, that treats dividend income and capital gains just like a worker's salary. Presently and inexcusably, we tax a worker's income usually at higher rates than the utterly passive income earned by a rich person holding shares.

The only justification given for corporate income tax within the progressive tax policy community is convenience: it is easier to collect taxes from one corporation than from millions of shareholders.

I believe we should (1) abolish corporate personhood, making corporations subject to different rules and obligations than individuals, (2) abolish corporate income taxes and all corporate tax breaks and breaks for high income shareholders and replace it with steep progressive taxation of individual income, (3) impose incredibly steep penalties for excessive compensation for executives, and (4) make corporate executives personally liable, criminally and civilly for corporate wrongdoing, environmental damage and other malfeasance without the possibilty of indemnification from corporate resources or even executive liability insurance.

[Az]

42. Illusions and identity

Just because it seems to be an illusion doesn't mean that an identity isn't in play. Corporations operate by rules. Just as our mind operates by rules. A sufficiently large and complex corporation exhibits behaviour beyond just the simple directions of its CEOs and directors. They are as much cogs in the corporate structure as individuals brain cells are to us.

The problem with corporate identities interacting with humans on equal footing(legally speaking) is that the rules that drive both of us on are not the same. The needs and desires of both are radically different. Corporations desire only a continual increase in profits. Humans desire and need a great deal more.

We desire social connectivity. We need food and shelter. We need so much more than corporations. And it is our needs and desires that form the structure of our society. As corporations grow in power and complexity their influence on our society becomes increase. The effect becomes degrading to society as we need and desire it. We are made over in their image over time and we become increasingly socially poverty stricken.

[Michael_Bush]

46. Perfectly Legal is a great book on Taxes

Thanks for the eloquent post. I had just assumed I had a reasonable grasp on taxes and such and after reading that class I almost dropped out of school it upset me so much.

David Johnson of the New York Times won a Pulitzer prize for his reporting on taxes and various awards for this book as well. It is an amazing book, one that will open the eye of almost everyone.

I agree with you about abolishing corporate personhood, I am still not sure about abolishing all corporate taxes but much of that does make sense. My fear in abolishing it is that we then lose our only way of trying to direct companies (ie research, lowering pollution, etc) I wholeheartedly agree about the need to reduce excessive compensation for execs (and Perfectly Legal will show you it is worse than you imagined) and by making corporate execs personally liable, I think you would see another huge shift in ways corps operate.

[AP]

54. There is so much with which I disagree in this post.

(1) I think corporate personhood is a red herring. I think it confuses the real issue, which is corporate size. Corporate personhood -- which I really take to mean limiting liability to the value of the shares for shareholders -- is probably the only way you can encourage people to engage in new, risky ventures that have the possibility of creating great benefits for society. Get rid of limited liability to screw big corps that take advantage it, you're also screwing over the next Steve Jobs inventing something in his garage or the the doctor who thinks he could possibly invent the cure for cancer if he can incorporate and draw investors.

(2) Abolish corp income tax: as I've said throught this thread, abolish corporate income tax, and you will turn corporations into an even more powerful entity. With or without personhood (however you imagine that) they will still be able to force government to bend to their will if you make them the one entity in America that doesn't pay taxes (and, unlike the church, they'd have no restrictions on what they need to do to protect their tax free status). You're not going to get high progressive taxes if you make coprorations all-powerful.

(3) Impose steep penalities for excesseive comensation? See (2). I just doubt that could happen. If you let corporations amass incredible economic power by not taxing their income, you're simply not going to be able to exert any political power on them at all.

(4) We already do this. But if you mean destroying limited liability completely, the benefits you'd get from holding super large corporations to those standards you'd totally offset by destroying entrepreneurialism at the other end of the scale, and, again, if corporations become more powerful than the government because they have so much amassed, untaxed wealth, you're not going to get this other stuff. They'll use their ownership of the newspapers and TV stations to convince the public to elect politicians who won't regulate them like that.

Taxation gets to the root of it all: money. Taxation ensures that people who do really well pay for a government that creates a playing field which allows everyone to do well. Not taxing any one entity would allow so much power to amass in that entity that it would dominate society and ensure a political landscape in which that entity could never be touched. Not taxing corporations at all would cede government to the dominion of corporations.

[Az]

59. By abolishing identity

We move responsibility back to individuals. In this way the individuals that are responsible for guiding the corporation will have their own motivations placed back in the guiding seat rather than the corporations far more limited needs. This reintroduces social impact and desire to a corporations guidance. A CEO of a corporation today is guided by the demands of the corporation. This creates a seperation between social and corporate drives.

[HamdenRice]

63. Thanks for a very thoughtful, if disagreeing reply ... but

I think you may be misunderstanding some of my proposals.

1. I think you are confusing corporate personhood with limited liability. Corporate personhood is the idea, novel until the late 19th century, that a corporation was a person for purposes of constitutional rights. This has nothing whatsoever to do with limited liability. It meant that a state government or the federal government could not regulate a corporation in a way that would violate it's due process and property rights if that corporation were a person.

Limited liability is, legally, the limited liability of shareholders, not of founders, managers or the corporation itself. It means that if you invest $100 in say IBM shares, the only thing you can lose is your $100 if the corporation's liabilities exceed its assets, even if as a result of malfesance.

By contrast, a partner in a partnership has unlimited liability. If you invest $100, but your share of the partnership's liabilities is $1000, you have to go into your pocket and come up with the difference.

Limited liability in corporations has never applied to management. That's why managers who engage in for example insider trading or stock manipulation can lose everything if they are held liable to shareholders and if neither the corporation or an insurance policy indemnifies them.

We can abolish corporate personhood without abolishing limited liability. It would simply mean that we recognize that corporations are not people and are established under law for the public good and are therefore subject to regulations that private real individuals may not be subject to, and that corporations do not have all the rights of real individuals.

2. Abolishing corporate taxes does not make corporations any bigger than they already are -- and they are very big! I did not spell out all the measures of a progressive agenda for corporate taxation and reform, but usually progressive tax policy writers who favor abolishing corporate taxes also propose "excess retained profits taxes." That means that a corporation must distribute its profits to shareholders so that those profits can be taxed as individual income. It also means that corporations cannot grow too big just by accumulating pots of money. They can invest money or distribute it, but cannot just sit on it. This actually makes the corporation more efficient in its investment decisions, because it joins the internal corporate investment market with the external investment market, meaning that the internal rate of return must approximate the external rate of return.

2. and 3. If corporations are not taxed, then they largely drop out of the entire taxation political debate, and the case for low taxes has to be made in more transparent terms: namely, rich people whining about not being rich enough. The smokescreen of investment incentives falls away.

And by recognizing that corporations are not persons and don't have free speech rights, we can basically tell them they cannot participate in politics as corporations, even though their managers and shareholders can.

4. Again you are confusing limited liability of shareholders with limited liability of management. Please understand: management does not have limited liability, shareholders do. What we do have, however, is a private system within corporations, whereby the corporation agrees as part of the management employment contract to indemnify each manager out of the corporation's own resources and through the purchase of liability insurance.

This is a classic "moral hazard" as economists call it. If the manager pillages the corporation and the shareholders successfuly sue the manager, bizarrely, it is the corporation (and hence the shareholders) who pay the damages through indemnification of management. It is utterly circular and prevents shareholders from holding management responsible. It is as though the shareholders have to pay themselves for the bad behavior of the management.

Moral hazard is regulated and prevented in almost every other context. For example, if you burn down your house, you cannot collect fire insurance proceeds. It is only because corporate management is politically powerful that this scandal is allowed to persist.

[HamdenRice]

65. One more part of the puzzle: transparent corporate voting

Thanks for all your replies. I forgot to add another important piece of the puzzle in my post. That is, re-introducing shareholder democracy. Currently, a vast portion of corporate investment is actually indirectly owned by individuals, through pension plans, 401Ks, IRAs, mutual funds, etc. The vast majority of shares are voted by proxies given to powerful insiders. Hence voting of corporate shares is entirely a game of insiders. One of my professors once sarcastically asked, "you know what a corporate election is like? A young law associate with a suitcase full of proxies in a hotel in Buffalo." Sad but true.

If we could create a pass through right of real people to vote in corporate elections, we could broaden the concerns of corporations from just profit maximization to all the relevant social concerns of their true owners.

[Az]

38. Taxes on a corporation as simply passed on to the consumer

But anything that is given the rights of a citizen must be taxed. If the corporations wish to be removed from the burden of paying taxes then their identity as a tax paying citizen should be revoked as well.

[muriel_volestrangler]

43. Two areas of loopholes you would have to watch out for

and the only justification for changes would be if you can block up existing loopholes in these areas, are:

how foreign owners or foreign subsidiaries are taxed - the rich will use the tax laws of multiple nations to take advantage of any type of low tax rate

what if corporations aren't taxed for a few years, and the profits build up inside corporations - and then another government comes in, and reverses the change so that future corporate profits are taxed, but accumulated profits can be taken out at lower dividend or capital gains tax rates?

[Sgent]

53. Few comments and thoughts

First off, can anyone tell me how to build a prius w/o corporate personhood, or a chevy, or perform any other item that can't be done with the capital of one person? I certainly don't know of a form other than the corporation that can do this -- as far as I know, its never existed in history, so someone please enlighten me. Keep in mind that "corporate personhood" is essentially the same for business purposes as a partnership.

As for foriegn tax stashing, that's one of the major issues currently. If I setup a foriegn corporation in the Barbadoes, and sell my name, patents, etc. to that corporation, then I pay royalties to that corporation from the U.S. Corporation, I have no corporate income tax.

Personally I would do a few things... First of all, I would eliminate the corporate income tax completely. Next, I would require all corporations with 10 million or more in capital to pay out 1/2 of the following in dividends no less than annually: Net Income + depreciation - cash investments in real assets (ie not other stocks). Finally, tax the dividends as earned income, and set rates where they would need to be.

As for the limited liability aspects, I have a mixed view on this one. Although I certainly think officers and directors need to have more liability than has been shown in the last 20 years or so, I am not for unlimited liability. I think Sarbanes-Oxley probably is a good start, we'll see where that comes out after the first prosecutions under it. Destroying this aspects of corporations too much would make it impossible to raise capital, as I as a stockholder am not willing to take on all liabilites, joint and several, of GE if I buy 100 shares.

Finally, I would restructure the way shareholder's elect board of director's. Anyone with more than 2% ownership can propose a slate, and its an up or down vote, biannually. The same candidates could be on multiple slates so as to provide continuity (and to allow the good board members to stay on). This should drastically increase accountability of the board to the stockholders, which should reign in much of the excessive pay we've seen. I should mention I don't inherently have a problem with someone being paid a lot of money if they earn it.

[Occulus]

67. On building a Prius

Nobody is saying that corporations should not exist. We are merely saying that what we currently call the 'rights' of a corporation should actually be nothing more than privileges, granted at the pleasure of the public and just as swiftly revoked if the public is harmed by the corporation.

And the public is often harmed. This is not to say that all corporations do harm to the public, but rather to point out that there have been a number of harmful corporate activities that have taken place in the last century that have done sometimes immense harm (a quick glance at the status and condition of federal Superfund sites would serve as one example). And yet, were an individual to, for example, pour oil into an Alaskan bay, that individual would be jailed.

Corporations cannot be jailed. They have been known to exploit this.

Some would say that is what fines are for, but fines ignore the fact that the corporation is still in active operation. In the case of the individual, he is kept behind bars from any public interaction; his business may go on, but he may not participate. In a great many cases, the individual will lose his income completely. Corporations are treated much differently; they are allowed to continue to make money even as they pay fines which, in the long run, do not hamper the making of that money.

It would be far better a punishment to force the corporate doors closed for a length of time, rather than any system of regulations and fines, but I digress. They are allowed to pay mere fines for what amount to crimes (Enron), crimes in which in some cases individual actual humans lose their lives as a result. This is completely unacceptable.

Yet that ultimate solution- closing the corporate doors due to misdeeds- has not been applied as a punishment (to my knowledge) in my lifetime; no judge would ever issue a ruling requiring that the corporation in question close its doors for a month as punishment. The doctrine of corporate personhood prevents this, although I'd like to know what exactly the legal reasoning behind such a refusal would be.

Corporate personhood is destructive in other ways as well. We, as individuals, cannot tear off an arm and have it become another person; it takes a great deal less effort than it takes humans for corporations to reproduce! Moreover, corporations can 'live' in more than one place at the same time; humans, on the other hand, are limited by wherever their bodies happen to be.

Individuals, moreover, do not get tax breaks granted them when they move into town. This practice of offering tax incentives to individual corporations amounts to exactly that: a giveaway to an individual. Corporations should not get it both ways; they should not be considered persons and yet qualify for individual, targeted tax incentives. They should be forced to sink or swim on their own.

Finally, an individual corporation can apply a great deal more political pressure to lawmakers than any single individual is able to. By allowing corporations to amass vast sums offshore (and therefore tax-free) we are, in effect, handing off our representation to other financially interested parties. This further submerges the right of the People to effective representation adherent to their needs beneath the sole, financial interests of the corporations in question and their lobbyists. It is, truly, a massively corrupt system.

All these things- the pollution of public lands with harmful or fatal chemicals, the abuse of the political process by corporations only interested in making more and ever more money, the drainage of the People's treasuries by demonstrably greedy corporations such as Enron and Halliburton, and in fact many of the problems and situations on the geopolitical landscape planetwide, can be traced back to the ability of the American corporation to be considered a 'person' and therefore in possession of certain 'rights'.

They are, in general, abusing those right. One only has to look, not at the declaration of water as a salable commodity in certain arid regions, not to the continuing destruction of the Amazon rain forest, and not even to Federal Superfund sites, but to your own town's main street, to see the damage corporate personhood can do.

Look to whom abandoned corporate property gets sold- the city in which it lies rarely benefits, itself, from the sale. Other corporations buy the property. Look to Wal-Mart, desiccator of small towns nationwide. Look at the fast food giants, cajoling millions per year into eating unhealthy (but fast!) food the sources of which could- could- be a mechanism for spreading mad cow, or severed fingers. /snark

MY overall point is, corporate personhood itself has done far more damage than the simple existence and public control of corporations themselves ever would have done on its own. If we do not rein in this power of the individual conferred upon a nonliving legal construct, we will, in the end, wind up living for the corporation.

And in many ways, we already do exactly that.

[Jack Rabbit]

47. No

We should eliminate corporate personhood.

That's short of eliminating corporations. The world would be a better place without the Fortune 500.

[LuPeRcALiO]

57. no, we should increase them

by eliminating tax breaks for offshoring and outsourcing, to start with.

[Cleita]

62. Okay most mega-companies have found loopholes around

taxes to begin with, by registering overseas and other scams. We need to tax these companies especially hard with tariffs until they agree to keeping 60% of their business and jobs in the USA. They must keep their headquarters in the USA also. Then maybe we can talk about lowering corporate taxes.

[aion]

64. Absolutely! And income taxes as well!!

The only proper place for taxation is at the marketplace. By taxing corporations, you drive the costs of their widgets up. The price of making those widgets then includes such things as 'medical care' and 'retirement/pension', etc.

In a closed system, this would not be a problem. But as Globalism increases, our people are having a very difficult time selling our widgets -- they simply cost too much, and they compete against widgets made by foreign corporations which do not have such worker benefits.

While it may be tempting to say that corporations should pay 100% of the taxes, a little bit of rational thought will show you that this simply will cause massive unemployment.

By doing away with income taxes and corporate taxes, we would be left with the marketplace. By taxing all sales at the marketplace, our widgets would be on equal ground with foreign-made widgets. The taxes wouldn't be disproportionately collected from American-MADE goods, but rather all goods SOLD in the country.

Tax the sale, not the production.

[Sgent]

68. Pesonally....

I love the idea of a sales tax/consumption tax. I haven't thought all the way through it, but there are some items that make me squirm.

1) Its not progressive above a lower level. Yes, everyone would get 5K a year or whatever amount as a refund, but there is no progrestivity above that.

2) I think there should be a wealth tax on "paper" assets.

Possibly, with the implementation of #2, #1 won't matter so much.

[aion]

73. Cash has a tax on it already -- inflation

I consider Cash a paper asset, and it most-definitely already has a tax on it. Inflation.

I don't understand your mentioning of a 'refund'. I see no reason for issuing refunds. That is simply inefficient, and indicates that too much was taken to begin with. Figure out how much you need, look at how much is being sold, and figure out what tax % would be appropriate at the marketplace.

I do not claim that all goods should be taxed the same, however. I only contend that the only proper place for taxation is the marketplace. You may have a VAT (value added tax) on such things as Yachts, Gas Guzzlers, etc. That, for me at least, is an entirely seperate argument.

As for taxing property possession, I am completely against that. Perhaps I watched a few too many of the older episodes of Wheel of Fortune where the catch phrase was "Once you buy a prize, it is your's to keep." Once you pay for something, including the taxes, that something should be your's.

[Sgent]

80. Instead of paper

I probably should have said liquid. And I have no problem taxing liquid assets in theory -- including cash. Inflation is nothing more than your poor management of the money resulting in the loss of value, your not protecting your assets. The tax is something else. My thoughts are though to only tax asset amounts (liquid remember) of over 1,000,000 or so.

By refund, I meant that every national consumption tax proposal has had a 2-500/month check mailed to every person in the country. Its not a refund in the traditional sense, but rather is a way to insure that the first X% of purchases effectively have no tax on them.

[aion]

81. Inflation is a tax

What makes the dollar I hold worth-less over time? It's certainly not that the more newly-printed dollars are worth more. All of them, if legible, are worth the same. Holding on to such an item should not cause any depreciation whatsoever, yet it does. That is a hidden tax, my friend. By printing money ex-nihilo, our society most-definitely taxes people who hold that money.

I thought I was making a proposal myself. It was quite simple, and didn't involve any refunds whatsoever. I guess I don't count.

[Sgent]

89. Well

Then your proposal would be regressive and destructive on the middle class. At least as stated, a broad based, universal, consumption tax would be terribly regressive, and I can't see how you would consider this to be a good thing.

As for inflation. If you hold the actual bills... then its a tax I agree. The fact is that anyone with a 1,000,000+ in liquid assets isn't going to be holding bills. 30 day t-bills beat the rate of inflation, and always have (or tied it in worst cases). Thus, as I said before, holding the money isn't a looser by itself. You put a wealth tax on it, an your worth will decrease, unless you are investing the assets in something that stimulates the economy.

[Stinky The Clown]

70. "Tax the sale, not the production."

And, at least on its face, this plan would tax the little guy, the poor, out of existence.

I guess that's one solution .......

[aion]

74. Completely wrong

This is simply untrue. You are not thinking it through enough, and you are adding things to the statement which are not contained within it.

"Tax the sale, not the production" says nothing about which things should be taxed, or whether the tax rate should be the same on all things.

[AP]

85. The solution to that problem is quite obviously that workers abroad need

better pay and not that we in the US should be driving for the bottom here so that the differences between cost of production and sale prices diverge even more (and, therefore, profits grow).

And, with no corporate or income tax, and only a sales tax, we'd need at least 30% sales tax to make up the lost revenue, and that's basically shifting the tax burden to people who spend the highest percentage of their income on consumer goods -- ie, poor people and people who work for a living.

[TheFarseer]

91. No No No, that was not my point at all

The fairest tax is to tax income. If you make money, you pay. The only point I was debating is whether to tax corporations or only people. The worst thing we could possibly do is to discourage buying and encourage stock-piling money especially by the rich. I support taxing the rich because you can't get blood from a turnip, if you want to get money you have to tax the people with money.

[Snotcicles]

69. I say eliminate corporate Texas n/t

[Snotcicles]

72. Tax Opulence only. n/t

[LuPeRcALiO]

76. If we need to "help" corporations, let's nationalize health care

so they don't have to provide medical benefits.

They don't pay any taxes anyway.

[PurityOfEssence]

82. Huge leap of logic

If they're not taxed, they'll expand and make more jobs and behave ethically and for the long-term benefit of society. Sez who? Maybe they'll just work as the active-transport root system of a plant and suck everything they can out of the world while giving back as little as possible. Maybe they'll stash profits offshore and simply run their business into bankruptcy while keeping piles of cash for the principals and leaving taxpayers to pick up the pieces for obligations unfulfilled. Nah, that'd never happen...

If you want results tied to performance, then tie results to performance. Lessen the tax rates if they're doing certain proscribed things like creating jobs or contributing to the building of critical industries. Of course, such plans are antithetical to unrestrained business, because they would allow some meddlesome bureaucrats to make judgments about the business' activities.

It's like the idiotic bellyaching about tax rates hurting small businesses; if that's the issue, then make small businesses the only ones who can benefit. It all comes down to the broad-strokes assumptions that certain people will benefit, without showing who the hell else will, who will suffer, and who REALLY gets the lion's share of the windfall.

Taxation is an attempt to accurately bill individuals and entities. Tax policy is constantly influenced by people scheming ways to get others to shoulder the burden while they mooch off of the efforts of others. Civilization COSTS. To allow anyone--especially the rich--to be freeloaders while burdening others with the tab is not only wrong, it's destructive to the system.

Corporations, like human beings, should be taxed because they suck goods and services out of society whether they try to or not. Paying the damn bill is something we all have to shoulder, and I have far less pity for a mythical being like a corporation than I do for a real-live human being. Corporations are not over taxed. Corporations aren't discriminated against these days.

Lest we forget, making operating costs a bit stiffer also sobers up the systems and makes them more competitive. If we bite on Corporate Socialism, there's not such an impetus for them to not be slovenly parasites. This is capitalism; it's supposed to be a bit tough. When we inject endemic subsidies into the system, we create pockets of uselessness.

Bad idea. Bad idea from both the functional and symbolic vantage.

It's very simple: if you want to create a specific effect, then sculpt policy that does it directly. This is the truth of the huge lies of the conservatives. Tax cuts for the rich weren't to ensure more monies being invested in the private sector, they were for the more selfish of the rich. (Many rich people have brains, hearts and a fealty to society; they pay their taxes.) If they'd wanted to ensure monies got pumped into investment, they would have made the tax cuts contingent on doing so. Of course, that would have entailed people meddling in the affairs of others, which is antithetical to our national consciousness. It's like the estate tax: if it hurts small businesses, then exempt them from the tax. This will NEVER be done, though, because it's a smokescreen to cover up what's really wanted: creating an aristocracy of money supported and sustained by the workers and the poor.

[AP]

88. You should be president.

You're exactly right about this.

[bemildred]

90. Eliminate corporations.

They are merely a blame and liability avoidance mechanism.
The fiction that they are "persons" is at the root of the
decay of our political system and the consequent decay in our
fortunes.