I'm working with what you gave me, my friend. You've discussed no other points other then this tax crap as the basis for Apple being unethical. So, my friend, What, in your opinion, makes a company unethical since it's not just this? If you're going to argue about degrees of being ethical why not tell us what makes Apple different from other companies in their ethics?
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How Apple Minimizes its Corporate Tax Burden
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I'm working with what you gave me, my friend. You've discussed no other points other then this tax crap as the basis for Apple being unethical. So, my friend, What, in your opinion, makes a company unethical since it's not just this? If you're going to argue about degrees of being ethical why not tell us what makes Apple different from other companies in their ethics?
Because that is what the thread is about.
If you want to hold a more general discussion, start a new thread. I may or may not participate depending on the content of the discussion. So far as this request though, it strikes me as off-topic.
Haha you've gotta be kidding me. What a cop out. We're having a discussion and it's naturally going to progress into different topics especially when you're talking about varying levels of ethical behavior. Now when questioned about it, you don't wanna go off topic (when you're the one who first bought up serial killers and murderers?)...that's rich.
I don't want to be the one to make you unethically go off topic, though!
This thread is great: 1] nyt prints bogus news, 2] people go crazy and start saying Apple is unethical, 3] people won't admit that all companies do this, 4] people refuse to discuss ethics cuz its off topic now that we find that nyts story is bogus. Awesome.
Yes, but we still should make an attempt to keep things confined to the original discussion.
Yes I introduced that analogy, but to make a point immediately germane to the original discussion.
I fear you may be throwing the baby out with the bath water. The NYT made some mistakes, perhaps, but a lot of what they said still applies.
Rather than insult people you should address the substance of the issue.
We have on countless occasions. What you seem to continually miss though is that mentioning this point is not relevant. It doesn't help Apple or the discussion in any way.
Weren't you the one claiming just a few posts back you thoughts ethics had no place in the discussion? I guess you changed your mind. Here are your words in post 832, lest you forgot them.
But of course, when it furthers your point, right? God forbid you're asked to backup your claims, suddenly we're going off topic!
You said being ethical is not all or nothing, i asked you to provide what your basis for ethics is then. Responding to your statement directly is not germane?
The only thing they said that still applies is Apple looks for ways to reduce their tax burden. You can change the title of this thread to "how insert company here minimizes it's corporate tax burden" and everything nyt said would still apply.
I have...multiple times. I stated it's not an ethics discussion and that all companies do this. That's the substance of the issue. This is forum fodder. Something to argue about to pass time at work. I'm doing it, and you're doing it. You can't really believe that any company is going to start paying more then they need to for ethical reasons right? This "news" story is a joke.
It doesn't help google, Microsoft, insert company here in anyway either. What you and i are both guilty of is colossally wasting our time. This is like saying "companies pay their employees" and printing a story about it. Non story.
Not at all, it has no place in the discussion. I'm not now arguing that it does. I'm arguing my point that it has no place. What made you think i changed my mind?
I for one don't think what Apple's doing is unethical or illegal. I DO BELIEVE though that before the government tries to raise taxes on the folks that they need to come up with some ideas on how to prevent these loop holes from happening. Talk about paying a "fair share".
If it was 100 degrees outside and I have the window open I won't raise my air conditioning to a colder temp. I CLOSE the window, then make adjustments to the A/C if that doesn't get the temp to where I need it. Same thing with taxes. Fix the loop holes, then re-evaluate if/what taxes need to be raised. Same thing with border. Fix the holes, then figure out a way to smoothly move legal workers back and forth. Same with a sinking boat. Fix the hole before you start bailing water out with a tea cup. Same with a car on fire. Extinguish the flames before you try troubleshooting why the car caught on fire. I could go on and on. Cart before the proverbial horse. Am I the only one this makes sense to?
If it was 100 degrees outside and I have the window open I won't raise my air conditioning to a colder temp. I CLOSE the window, then make adjustments to the A/C if that doesn't get the temp to where I need it. Same thing with taxes. Fix the loop holes, then re-evaluate if/what taxes need to be raised. Same thing with border. Fix the holes, then figure out a way to smoothly move legal workers back and forth. Same with a sinking boat. Fix the hole before you start bailing water out with a tea cup. Same with a car on fire. Extinguish the flames before you try troubleshooting why the car caught on fire. I could go on and on. Cart before the proverbial horse. Am I the only one this makes sense to?
No complaints ...
Frankly, corporations should pay $0 income tax. Corporations are pieces of paper. People pay taxes.
Politicians created this ... not Apple nor any other business.
Simple solution ... flat tax, every one pays the same rate across the board.
Just because some one or some company makes more money than some one else or some other company does NOT mean they should pay more as a percentage.
Flat tax rate ... eliminate all deductions. Period.
Frankly, corporations should pay $0 income tax. Corporations are pieces of paper. People pay taxes.
Politicians created this ... not Apple nor any other business.
Simple solution ... flat tax, every one pays the same rate across the board.
Just because some one or some company makes more money than some one else or some other company does NOT mean they should pay more as a percentage.
Flat tax rate ... eliminate all deductions. Period.
You know a flat tax us very regressive and makes the poor bare the brunt of the tax burden
Folks,
In the very end, it all comes down to this: US income tax laws based on Title 26, the Internal Revenue Code, legally allows corporations to "offshore" jobs, factories and corporate headquarters as a means of tax avoidance. What Apple did was completely legal with current US tax law.
Given all the disadvantages of the current income tax system I've mentioned in the past, that's why I'm all for going to a 17% flat-rate no-loophole (outside of a generous initial earned income exemption) income tax--essentially the plan proposed by Steve Forbes in 1996. That way, Apple doesn't need to keep the majority of its cash holdings outside the USA for tax avoidance reasons and Apple could have more factories assembling its products in the USA--a win-win for the US economy.
In the very end, it all comes down to this: US income tax laws based on Title 26, the Internal Revenue Code, legally allows corporations to "offshore" jobs, factories and corporate headquarters as a means of tax avoidance. What Apple did was completely legal with current US tax law.
Given all the disadvantages of the current income tax system I've mentioned in the past, that's why I'm all for going to a 17% flat-rate no-loophole (outside of a generous initial earned income exemption) income tax--essentially the plan proposed by Steve Forbes in 1996. That way, Apple doesn't need to keep the majority of its cash holdings outside the USA for tax avoidance reasons and Apple could have more factories assembling its products in the USA--a win-win for the US economy.
Only if you ignore the meaning of the terms "flat tax" and "regressive tax" (or make up your own). A flat tax isn't regressive or progressive by definition!
on the surface a flat tax appears to be equal but reality it is another story. If other cost were linear by nature then yeah it would be fair but that is far from the case. Cost of living is far from linear with income. It is a logarithmic function. The more you make the less of your income goes to cost of living. This means less disposable income. Now if you tax disposable income equally then yeah it would be fine but that is impossible to do with out a progressive system.
Also you can not exactly tax revenue on a flat tax system. Since revenue is very different than profit. Then you would have the big companies still being able to pull accounting tricks to make cost look out of line to make their profit appear smaller.
People seem to think a flat tax is fair when it is far from the case. The result of a flat tax would be the rich paying a lot less and the poor paying a lot more.
I'd say that building offices in Texas, huge server farms and shipping warehouses in other states, etc. does not QUITE equate to using P.O. boxes. Not to mention hiring assembly plants and buying components in foreign countries.
Additionally, it is quite easy to point out that the main admin offices in CA do NOT generate most of the profit. Sorry, but the ACTIVE places that sell Apple hardware and provide Apple services are what MAKE the profit. The main offices (people in CA) just organize and keep track of it all. Administration does not make profit, it simply organizes things to maximize profit generated from those sections (those "P.O. boxes you refer to) that do generate profit.
Final point: when it comes to taxes, legal IS ethical. Why? Because of the great disparity in opinion of what is ethical in taxation. As far as I am concerned, the entire premise that the wealthy owe more for being wealthy is an unethical premise, under the generality that any law which purposely treats one sector of the population differently than another is an unethical law. We are SUPPOSED to be a society of EQUALITY, not "one rule for them, different rule for us".
None of that means that a flat tax is regressive. It's not. By definition of both terms.
Less than what? More than what? That statement depends completely on what you are comparing it to and the actual implementation.
By definition yeah it appears that way but in reality it is regrestive. Big time if you start really looking at it. They get people to believe it and buy it hook line and sinker. If you take a little bit to understand it then you would see why.
I will say currently. That would be the result.
Wow. Is it like one of those optical illusions where if you start looking at it really carefully the words change meaning? Black becomes white, etc.?
A flat tax is not a regressive tax in definition or in reality. It a tax is regressive in reality, it's a regressive tax, not a flat tax.
You will say currently? That just leaves the thousands of different taxes on the books now to choose from. At least you eliminated some all of them taxes from the 1800s.
And of course ignores any actual implementation details of a flat tax.
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good luck. Tell me how do you keep the same renuvue with out decrease tax on the rich and increasing the tax on the poor with a flat tax. Give you a hint you can not.
The problem is that as soon as you close one tax loophole, their very well paid lawyers search and search until they find some new creative accounting method or loophole to avoid paying their taxes. Legal doesn't mean ethical. It means obeying the technical wording of the law while breaking the spirit of the law. Frankly, if a flat tax rate means these bozos finally have to pay their fair share, I say do it. I'm sick of lobbied deductions and corrupt government officials doing everything in their power to make sure the wealthiest Americans and corporations pay the lowest percentage of taxes around. Build jobs my back-end. These are the same creeps that put families out of jobs so they can pay 1/20 as much in 3rd world countries with sweatshop conditions. At some point society falls apart when the top few wage earners control almost all the wealth. It happened before in the Middle Ages and we're heading there AGAIN.
Wealth redistribution gets demonized to death, but the sad fact is that if you don't force companies to share the wealth, they'll take it all until there's nothing left and no consumers left to buy the goods. Greed literally knows no bounds, even to its ultimate detriment when society crumbles. If a company is making record profits, that means it can afford to hire more people and/or give a raise to its employees, the same ones that made that profit possible. CEOs do not do 50,000x the work of an average worker and definitely do not deserve it. If you look at wages in the past 50 years, you see the top brass rates going through the stratosphere, while the rest of the workers have been slowing down and stagnating, all while food and gas keeps going through the roof while economists don't count them as part of inflation (how convenient).
Are you just going to switch up your argument every post? That still doesn't make a flat tax regressive. It just makes it not progressive.
But there are many solutions to your question. Eliminate deductions for the rich. Tax a larger percentage of their income. Replace regressive taxes such as sales tax with a flat tax. Don't tax income below poverty level.
Correct. But the "entitled" want to extract more resources from the "productive" because the "entitled" are under-motivated to do whatever it takes to get better jobs or income, even if they do have to start a business and create them themselves. Like the "productive" already did.
Rocketman
Exactly, and it is how government wants it to be. The more the people are dependent on the government, the more power government has. We have become a culture of dependency, from dependency on government for retirement and healthcare and welfare, to dependency on big business for jobs, demanding "livable" wages for doing something a trained monkey can do as well. Witness all the ways people are being replaced by machines - not because machines are better, but because the people have priced themselves out of the job market.
Entrepreneurs are becoming more and more rare. It's no longer up to people to find employment, it is up to business to supply it for them, and when they don't, it's the fault of big business for being greedy and selfish.
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Which would pretty much eliminate the business. Without customers, they'd go broke quite rapidly. These kinds of claims are ridiculous.
CEO pay is what it is. Some CEOs DO deserve their huge salaries. Steve Jobs came into a corporation on the brink of insolvency and left it the world's leader in innovation, as well as being the richest. Are you going to claim he did not deserve the wealth he accumulated in the process? There are literally millions of people world wide who are way better off due to Apple corporation being what it is, and that is a direct result of Jobs' leadership.
OTOH, there are CEO's who shouldn't be allowed to shove fries out a driveup window without supervision. But that is for the various BODs to decide, not people on a BBS, nor government regulators.
Let me try this one please...
What are ultra liberals, Jack ?
I think you made a typo and got some of it backwards, but I know what you're trying to say. But the solution to the problem is to not over analyze it, just deal with percentages. It's really not fair to punish prosperity. Hell it might even motivate a few people.
Now, these guys are harping on Apple. What about Cisco ? Their solution was to layoff 5,000 US workers and move there corporate officers to Ireland. How many here think that's unethical, but still buy Linksys routers ?
Ding ding ding...correct.
Oh but you forgot...cisco is "more ethical" then Apple...
Apple is the extreme. Cisco is a little ethicaler!