And Rush went off on the guy, I think rather unfairly. (So much so that I quote only what Rush had to say about corporate taxes, and leave off his insults to the caller).
RUSH: ExxonMobil paid $78.6 billion in taxes worldwide. In the United States they paid $7.7 billion in sales tax and duties. But our caller was exploiting one technically correct point, because the company can deduct foreign taxes, and it did get a refund on federal taxes. But Exxon's effective income tax rate was 47% worldwide, the highest in three years. But they can deduct taxes they pay around the world so that's why they got a federal refund, and GE is doing the same thing. GE, $5 billion in profit, and they pay no tax in the United States because it's earned outside the United States.
Now, corporations pay a 35% tax rate in this country. It's the highest in the world. They pay a ridiculously high federal corporate tax for the most part based on what other countries tax their companies, and after they pay their corporate tax, then the shareholders who cash out their investments pay a capital gains tax on top of the corporate income tax already paid by the corporation, and the people who work for the corporation pay an individual federal income tax on top of what the corporation already has paid its corporate income tax. A dollar earned by a corporation is taxed not once but at least twice. This is how successful the left has been. Their enemies list is every corporation. They've got people believing that they don't pay taxes. The people that work at these companies pay taxes. The corporations do.
But here's the dirty little secret, Mr. Dummkopf. The dirty little secret is that corporations don't pay taxes. They build the taxes into the price of the product you buy or pay for. All of those costs are built into the cost of the product or service the corporation's producing for the consumer. Now, maybe Warren Buffett's company is disputing its tax bills since 2002 with the federal government, but many companies have been paying on time what they are said to owe. Warren Buffett is in arrears. Warren Buffett, who wants you paying every dime of your estate tax, is fighting the Berkshire Hathaway income tax. And while we are at it here, what of the hundreds of billions of dollars a year that the federal government misuses or pays in fraudulent schemes every year? Imagine if individuals and businesses could keep the money instead. Why is this never considered when we talk about taxation? Hundreds of billions of dollars every single year.
The General Accounting Office puts out endless reports on this waste. Where do you people get off? I get so ticked off at you intellectually lazy people who think that the government is God, that every dollar they get or spend is somehow sacred. There is more fraud and waste and misuse. If the federal government were held accountable to the law as corporations are held accountable, half the federal government would be in prison. But, no, the government is good, the government is taking care of poor people, the government's caring for people with health care and Medicaid and Medicare and Social Security. Fixing fraud, waste, and crime in the government seems to never be a priority. Instead, whether we are screwing some individual or class of individuals or companies is the priority.
Warren Buffett hasn't paid taxes for his company for four of the last ten years. He's disputing it. But when it comes to the estate tax he wants you to pay as much as you can be made to pay. Claims that ExxonMobil did not pay taxes in 2009 are just plain incorrect. All these other companies as well. ExxonMobil paid $78.6 billion in taxes worldwide. But the precious US government didn't get its fair share of this. Why should they? They're trying to put 'em out of business, for crying out loud. The United States government under Barack Obama is trying to make it impossible for ExxonMobil to do business in this country.
____________
My Schedule of Regular Posts:
*Monday through Friday morning - schedules of President, VP and Secretary of State and her diplomats
*Monday through Friday afternoon - List of topics Limbaugh discussed on his program that day
*Monday through Friday throughout the day - My posts on anything that I feel like talking about. At least one or two a day, sometimes more.
*Saturday through Sunday morning - An addition to my booklist of political books - covering Democrats, Republicans and other interested parties.
No comments:
Post a Comment