Has GE paid their fair share compared to our small-to-medium sized manufacturing plants who produce widgets here inside the US? How about against their direct competitors like Sylvania and Philips?
I’m curious if they have an unfair advantage, or if their tax breaks are a necessity to competitively survive. What would happen to GE and it’s stockholders if all the doors on tax breaks were slammed shut in 2013?
Unless someone can show that GE lobbied for a particular piece of tax legislation and it was passed so that they could disproportionately take advantage of it over other tax payers, these so called “tax breaks” that the OP and protesters talk about are the tax law and available to all tax payers, like deducting losses. GE doesn’t have specific tax breaks that they alone get so they can remain competitive.
According to this NYT piece from over a year ago (last tax season, of course) GE does precisely that, Omar. In particular they cite lobbied-for breaks for wind turbines and foreign leasing arrangements.
The upshot is that GE paid something around 7% as an effective corporate tax rate that year. They claim that is abnormally low and will go up in future years. We shall see, I suppose.
You don’t get as big and powerful as GE is by paying your “fair share”. Our tax code is a corporation’s dream come true. While the official tax rate is something like 35%, making it one of the highest in the world, the average tax rate is somewhere south of 10%. They all play the game, and they all get away with it.
Sounds like the beef lies at Rangel’s feet. We shouldn’t allow government officials to play favorites and decide the winners from the losers. Or in his case, trade legislative favors for contributions to schools in his district.
Has anybody ever calculated how much resources are wasted by firms like GE, in avoiding taxation? GE’s 2011 tax return ran to 57,000 pages-surely this represents a huge waste of manpower. Granted, GE is following the (immensely complicated) US Tax Code…but would it not be better to have a low, fixed rate tax?
The entire quote is "“I asked the GE tax officer, ‘How long was your tax form?’” Ryan said. “He said, ‘Well, we file electronically, we don’t measure in pages.’” Ryan asked for an estimate, which came back at a stunning 57,000 pages. When Ryan relayed the story at the townhall meeting in Janesville, there were audible gasps from the crowd. "
They didn’t actually mail in 57,000 pieces of paper.
Will stories like these actually help some folks who are entirely sure that raising the tax burden will effectively help us climb out of debt or will they now agree that closing these loops holes would serve us much better. (I am well aware of how generic all that is)
You know, so Warren Buffet actually pays more tax than his secretary.
Did GE play by the rules, sure. But…
The system is designed by lawyers for lawyers and the bottom line is the company with the most lawyers win. And worse yet you have the lawyers who the laws are supposed to affect influencing the lawyers writing the laws. They bury so many loop wholes that the average Joe will never find so he ends up footing the bill.
There should be one deduction. 30K for a single, 60K for couples, 250K for LLCs, 500K for corporations. Anything you make over that you pay.
“The tax code, in its majestic equality, allows the rich as well as the poor to take advantage of the Specified Gulf Opportunity Zone Extension Property Accelerated Depreciation Schedules (see Notice 2007-36 on page 1000 of the Internal Revenue Bulletin 2007-17)”
It’s really annoying when people say this because it’s flat out wrong. He doesn’t pay less tax than his secretary, he pays a lower overall tax rate.
Saying it that way would be akin to saying that Warren buffet pays less for a cheeseburger at McDonald’s than you do because it’s a lower percentage of his net worth.
