Exxon Mobil Paid No Income Tax in 2009:

[amborin]

"Last week, Forbes magazine published what the top U.S. corporations paid in taxes last year. “Most egregious,” Forbes notes, is General Electric, which “generated $10.3 billion in pretax income, but ended up owing nothing to Uncle Sam. In fact, it recorded a tax benefit of $1.1 billion.” Big Oil giant Exxon Mobil, which last year reported a record $45.2 billion profit, paid the most taxes of any corporation, but none of it went to the IRS:

Exxon tries to limit the tax pain with the help of 20 wholly owned subsidiaries domiciled in the Bahamas, Bermuda and the Cayman Islands that (legally) shelter the cash flow from operations in the likes of Angola, Azerbaijan and Abu Dhabi. No wonder that of $15 billion in income taxes last year, Exxon paid none of it to Uncle Sam, and has tens of billions in earnings permanently reinvested overseas.

Mother Jones’ Adam Weinstein notes that, despite benefiting from corporate welfare in the U.S., Exxon complains about paying high taxes, claiming that it threatens energy innovation research. Pat Garofalo at the Wonk Room notes that big corporations’ tax shelter practices similar to Exxon’s shift a $100 billion annual tax burden onto U.S. taxpayers. In fact, in 2008, the Government Accountability Office found that “two out of every three United States corporations paid no federal income taxes from 1998 through 2005.”"

http://blogs.alternet.org/speakeasy/2010/04/06/outrageous-exxon-mobil-paid-no-income-tax-in-2009/

[daa]

1. This must be wrong, it can't be

Repugs alwasy say we have the highest corporate taxes in the world. Do they lie?

[Igel]

11. It probably is.

But how wrong, exactly, is up for grabs.

"Net income tax liability". Interesting phrasing.

The Forbes article that this was based on was revised. At least once.

ExxonMobil's gone on the record as saying that it overpaid estimated taxes in 2008 and those were applied to the 2009 tax bill. It's also said that it hasn't filed for 2009 so it couldn't state its income tax liability for 2009. How it washes out will have to wait for the filing and any IRS challenge.

Of course, the Forbes article was there to provoke indignation--here were are paying taxes, how dare the information in the Forbes article make us feel indignant? Why, I'll just have to go and buy one and get into a lather. (In other words, the Forbes article did precisely what it was intended to. Suckers.)

Actually, repubs don't say we have the *highest* corporate taxes in the world, just too high corporate taxes. The Forbes article points out that the 35% marginal rate *is* higher than many, and makes sheltering money in countries with lower rates--even if it costs money and efficiency--profitable for corporations. Whether it's too high or too inefficient I'll leave to those with more tax and economics savviness than I.

[Subdivisions]

2. See the 5-Star thread here:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=greatest_threads

or here:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x8097670

[amborin]

3. didn't see it, sorry!

[inna]

9. No reason to be sorry! I didn't see those two threads, either, so...

I appreciate you posting this!

K&R

[inna]

10. The more the merrier! I didn't see those threads,

and I'm sure lots of other people didn't see them, either.

[RKP5637]

4. Why don't the teabaggers and like get their panties in an uproar on crap like this... n/t

[sellitman]

5. Because their corporate masters wouldn't like that.

Any other questions for today?

That was too easy.

[RKP5637]

7. Thanks! LOL I knew it, I just had to say it, just had to say it! Ugh, they drive me nuts!

:hi:

[RKP5637]

6. dup

[Gidney N Cloyd]

8. And one of the arguments states make against raising taxes is that...

...corporations would pull up stakes and relocate to a cheaper state.
When you hear stories like this one, it's hard to believe any corporation couldn't find a way around state taxes like they do fed taxes.