Quote:
Originally Posted by tslust
Wow, to hear the liberals talk, the corporations in America are not taxed at all (in GE's [the company in obama's back pocket] case this would be true). The only country with a coperate rate higher than ours (40%) is United Arab Emirates.
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To hear some right wingers talk, you'd think they have a real aversion to something called facts. Where is the federal corporate tax rate 40%? Oh, you must be lumping in state and local tax rates to the "statutory minimum" federal rate of 35%. Yep, that's right, the federal tax rate is only 35%. And it only applies to businesses making over $18 million of taxable income. Income between $335,000 and $10 million is taxed at a flat rate of 34%. Income below the $335,000 threshold is taxed less.
It's certainly conceivable that if state and local taxes are added to the federal tax rate, a FEW corporations may pay in the neighborhood of 40%. But this is far from universally true-- if for no other reason that some state (and many municipalities) don't have corporate taxes at all.
Further, even if every state did have corporate tax to levy, still, the vast majority of corporations would pay nowhere near 40%. Those who know anything about business know that the effective tax rate (aka. the actual rate that a corporation ends up paying after factoring in deductions, credits, etc.) is 19%. Obviously, the distribution of deductions and credits is not even by business or industry-- under the current tax code, some corporations end up paying close to the federal "minimum" rate, others pay hardly any tax at all.
What does all this mean? That our tax code is definitely convoluted. But it also means that it's disingenuous to lay out a blanket percentage of tax rate as if it's fact that applies equally to all.
07-18-2012
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