Small clarification, Exxon-Mobil didn’t pay $35 billion in taxes. It collected $35.5 billion in taxes and internal accounting expenses from consumers and passed those costs on to the federal government. Corporations don’t pay taxes, they are a component of the cost of the product just like raw materials, marketing, salaries, etc. On top of the pass through of the taxes is the non-productive expense Exxon-Mobil et al must bear to collect those taxes. The corporate income tax requires an army of tax accountants. It would be cheaper to eliminate the corporate income tax and increase the sales tax.

What about Romney going after PBS? Sounds like even more demagoguing if you use the standards in this article.

I beg to differ with you but Corporations DO pay taxes. That is why there is a “Corporate Tax Rate”. The oil companies collect taxes from consumers as required by regulation and pass those monies on the the government, but those taxes are not included in the calculation of their net income. They are neither revenue nor expenses, just like your local businesses collect sales taxes and pass them long to state and local governments.

Corporations pay federal and state income taxes based on their net income, you know, Revenue minus Expenses, as defined by Generally Accepted Accounting Principles and the IRS. VAT (value added tax) becomes a component of of the cost of the product, but we don’t yet have a VAT in this country.

Correct. Exxon pays royalties, sales taxes, excise, import fees, payroll taxes, it probably adds up to over $100 billion, and exceeds their total income. Most of those are pass-through. The corporate income tax is on top of all those ‘passed on’ taxes. Ultimately the corporate tax is taken from the individuals, in this case the owners are getting a lower return.

And PBS bombards our kids with advertisements now as well. It’s difficult to see the difference between PBS and ‘commercial’ TV. They must be raking in a ton of money between the ads and the merchandising. I guess that means our PBS subsidies are going to ‘fat cats’.

His tax plan floated in the last week for handling deductions is interesting. It essentially says that most of the deductions out there will stay roughly in place (probably subject to future revision and streamlining), but all households get a max of $17k in claimable deductions.

It’s interesting because it still allows broad latitude in what the government will choose to credit, latitude to families in how they will make choices, but limits the overall impact of deductions. It would probably let you lower rates while keeping revenue mostly flat.

Most families won’t hit 17k in claimed deductions, so it’s useful for middle class families on average while limiting how much advantage someone can get from loopholes etc. Haven’t seen a full analysis on it though.

So, by this statement, the tax deductions for the Oil and Gas companies (with their all time record high profits) is the Federal Government picking the “losers”… which just goes to show you how flawed Romney’s reasoning is… and by your support of that statement, yours as well.

CPB collects no revenue from sponsors, those go to the local affiliates. I don’t think you know that everything done in Public Broadcasting is governed by statute and is tightly regulated. Educate yourself rather than blathering drivel like “I guess that means our PBS subsides are going to ‘fat cats’.” FYI, by law, only 5% of funds can be spent on administrative costs… 70% goes to local stations and the remainder goes for royalty payments to commercial production and media companies (made on behalf of all stations — because it’s less expensive than individual stations paying royalties), grants to independent producers and program development (that private investors see no commercial value in).

I’m curious to know…. what industry tax breaks would YOU have eliminated? Do you even know what others are in the tax code? Do you even care or do you just pick out a few like this to be critical about…

Also, you must be aware that the primary reason these sorts of tax breaks remain is that it is advantageous to the wealthiest do have them as well as the to the corporations who can off set expenses with them to show higher profits for investors.

“…when it comes to tax-advantaged investments for wealthy or sophisticated investors, one investment class continues to stand alone above all others: oil. With the backing of the U.S. government, domestic energy production has created a litany of tax incentives for both investors and small producers.”

Read more: http://www.investopedia.com/articles/07/oil-tax-break.asp#ixzz28UgPdOGf”

So, you oppose doing something similar for other industry that will compete with Oil and Gas… for no real reason other than it is supported by Democrats? Sorry, but that’s really unintelligent of you and, over all, bad for the nation as a whole as one day, the oil and gas will run out.

Did you turn your ears off when Romney said the petroleum subsidies probably WOULD be lost if his plan is installed?

Have you been asleep for four years? If Obama wanted to cut those subsidies, he could have done so in 2009 or 2010, take your pick. He was too busy pushing through an unwanted Health Insurance Industry Subsidy Act to worry about our energy needs.

BTW, tax subsidies for anybody else don’t hurt you at all if they result in enough additional tax payments to cover their cost. I do believe that fossil fuel industry tax payments far exceed their subsidies.

FWIW, I am in favor of eliminating ALL tax subsidies, both to oil and to “green” industries. If you want to make an exception for “new” ventures, change the form of subsidies so they aren’t dependent on the industry of the venture.

wow you hate Republicans, you hate oil companies, you thing Romney is a tax cheat, and you seek out a conservative site. That screams someone who has no life and too much time on his hands.

“primarily”
Actually, they couldn’t give a damn, but according to your side they’re greedy, stingy money grubbers.
Now, Gov. Romney has made clear that a wide range of subsidies, corporate welfare, preferences etc. are on the table, in any case. But to target a particular industry, and to use an invalid argument as a talking point…

the long and the short of it is that ALL corporations and small businesses pass on their tax liabilites to consumers through higher prices – so no, the do not pay taxes you pay more every time your purchase a product or servicce to cover the liability…..when my tax rates go up, I raise the prices that my clients must pay to cover those additional expenses

This same concept can be achieved by increasing the amount of the standard deduction so that people do not have to engage in specific behaviors, like buying a home or purchasing a green vehicle to get a deduction/credit in order to reduce their taxable liability. Basically raising the standard deduction to a range of 17k – 25k frees millions of people to decide what is best for them in determing and reaching long term goals. Some folks may want to purchase a home and build equity and other people might want to travel the world, right now only those that buy a home benefit from government largess through a tax reducing deduction.
A single person, age 45, with no children, may not want to build equity in a home to pass it on to a non-existant next generation but in order to keep some of their income (that the government would other take) they are more or less forced to purchase a home to tax shelter some of that income through the mortgage interest deduction. And who benefits most in this case – the banks that make as much in interest payments over 30 years as the principle amount of the house purchased and the real estate industry through high comissions on government driven policy. The 45 year old got a deduction (on the average 200,000 home) of about 4,000 a year for 10 years or a scant 40k in protected income and will not even start paying on the principle of the loan for another 5-8 years, so the only equity they have in the home is if real estate values have increased over that period of time.

the point is that those industries don’t compete they are totally supported by tax dollars and have yet to generate any taxable income and they cannot produce even 1/8 of the energy that oil, gas, and coal can — they are far more difficult to produce, using vast mining resources that require huge amounts of emissions to bring to the surface, create exponentially more land pollution in tailings and contaiment ponds, use vast amounts of limited water supplies, and in the case of wind are totally dependent on gas backup to produce a very limited amount of energy

Oh I see, you would rather that costs not be low, so that prices to consumers can rise I guess.

they absorb a tiny amount in lower profits, but only a very very little. So basically you are correct.

blah blah blah, Hey dumbass why don’t you educate yourself in what liberty means. Liberty means the central government doesn’t steal my money to waste on left wing propaganda machines like CPB. We now have hundreds of networks if there is programing that is not supported by the private market then that means no one wants to see it!

what a stupid lefty troll you are. Oh it’s only 450 million!, sure a half billion here, a half billion there and pretty soon you are talking about some real money. Oh, and last I looked the Oil companies in America pay a lot of taxes. And get no subsidies. Tax breaks are normal for exploration, drilling and mining companies, If you new any accounting you would now that. But you know nothing.