To me it reads like the usual right wing rhetoric, and that any tax collection is some form of evil socialism. Not quite sure how these people expect their flag waving military, for example, to be funded without the big corporation paying their fair share, but there you go.
Never understood why many Americans don't see paying tax as the ultimate act of patriotism, paying for the country they claim to love. They love the country, but resent paying for it. How does that work? Are they the ultimate freetards?
Small companies(S corps and LLCs) don't pay corporate taxes. C corps pay a wide variety of taxes depending on where they earn their profits, how aggressively they working to minimize tax burden, and how hard their industry lobbyists work.
Certainly some companies pay far more and far less than their fair share. I'd wager the tech companies who generally have little in the way of physical presence where they earn revenue, and have towns and cities competing for the chance to host their offices and data centers, probably pay very little relatively.
Obviously providing jobs for tax payers isn't unique to companies. I can pay for a nanny, chauffeur, and private cook even if I don't have a company. Since your logic is "X provides jobs so X shouldn't be taxed" then I shouldn't have to be taxed if I have any household staff, no?
That logic makes no sense. (If it makes sense to you, please elaborate. How many employees and how many FTEs does one need before this special exemption kicks in, and why that level?)
Now, by "company" I assume you mean "corporation." Corporations form for various reasons, the biggest being liability. Without it, shareholders could be sued individually.
This protection is worth something to the shareholders. I think it's perfectly reasonable that the state, which is the authority that grants companies the right to exist, should be able to extract something from the company - taxes and fees, for example - in order that the company may continue.
Do you think that corporations should exist without paying any fees to the state? If so, why should they get liability protection for free?
If the tax rate is too high, then people could switch from the corporate form of company to a sole proprietorship. A sole proprietor can have employees, and thus "provide jobs for tax payers", even though the business itself is not taxed separately from the proprietor's income.
Now, obviously there's a large set of trade-offs, and the example I gave - a switch to sole proprietorship - is too blunt. My point is that the idea that "provide jobs" necessarily implies "should not be taxed" is so simplistic that it more indicates a lack of understanding of why there are companies in the first place.
nodata|12 years ago
From the way I understand it, this is a way to get large companies to pay the same amount of tax as smaller companies.
alan_cx|12 years ago
Never understood why many Americans don't see paying tax as the ultimate act of patriotism, paying for the country they claim to love. They love the country, but resent paying for it. How does that work? Are they the ultimate freetards?
soup10|12 years ago
Certainly some companies pay far more and far less than their fair share. I'd wager the tech companies who generally have little in the way of physical presence where they earn revenue, and have towns and cities competing for the chance to host their offices and data centers, probably pay very little relatively.
Eye_of_Mordor|12 years ago
dalke|12 years ago
That logic makes no sense. (If it makes sense to you, please elaborate. How many employees and how many FTEs does one need before this special exemption kicks in, and why that level?)
Now, by "company" I assume you mean "corporation." Corporations form for various reasons, the biggest being liability. Without it, shareholders could be sued individually.
This protection is worth something to the shareholders. I think it's perfectly reasonable that the state, which is the authority that grants companies the right to exist, should be able to extract something from the company - taxes and fees, for example - in order that the company may continue.
Do you think that corporations should exist without paying any fees to the state? If so, why should they get liability protection for free?
If the tax rate is too high, then people could switch from the corporate form of company to a sole proprietorship. A sole proprietor can have employees, and thus "provide jobs for tax payers", even though the business itself is not taxed separately from the proprietor's income.
Now, obviously there's a large set of trade-offs, and the example I gave - a switch to sole proprietorship - is too blunt. My point is that the idea that "provide jobs" necessarily implies "should not be taxed" is so simplistic that it more indicates a lack of understanding of why there are companies in the first place.
lmm|12 years ago