Raising The Corporate Tax Is Inflation For All

He has spent, printed and spent some more. Now he wants to tax what we might earn…. Yet, he needs more. So in a time of unequaled inflation, he wants to raise the corporate tax rate….. Yeah, that’s right. Stick it to tha man…… Well, no…. When the cost of doing business increases, those increases trickle down…. Just as increases in profits trickle down. It is simple economics. And Biden’s creepy whisper doesn’t change that….. If your cost of living increases, your spending decreases. It works that way in a household. It works the same in business. Costs are spiraling out of control. So let’s compound the problem and increase the cost of doing business so that those increased costs can also trickle down to the consumer…. Not to mention employee raises and perks that we enjoy sharing with our staff….. This administration is an unmitigated disaster for the working families In this country.

 

Didn't know that you were a billionaire.

 

I wish I was. But the proposed new corporate tax rate applies to all corporate entities. When I listened to him talk about it, he did not distinguish the new rate as applying only to billion dollar corporations. However he was proud that it was lower than the corporate tax rate in the 1950’s….. As though that had anything to do with anything meaningful.

 

That I believe

That I'm skeptical of.

See: Applebee's. Maybe I'd believe in trickle down if profit sharing was enforced in employee contracts. It doesn't have to be through a union, but that's one way this is achieved. I know there are plenty of companies that do this voluntarily and in microcosms, trickle down does work for employees. However, there's plenty of places it doesn't happen as well, and I'd rather not be operating on luck of the draw/whims of my employer.

One thing I'd like clarified with trickle down theory, fortification vs expansion. Large employers with multiple regions/businesses especially, may be more interested in growing a business rather than passing profits onto their employees. That's great you opened 2 new storefronts, but if I don't get a raise and everyone there is paid around the same as me, how does that help me as an individual? Is reinvesting profits really helping the employees as individuals? If individuals aren't getting better situations from increased profits, is it really trickling down?

 

From what I'm reading the increase is on all corporations, from the current 21% rate to 28%. It doesn't really matter if you increase it on big or small companies; in the end, the consumers will pay more. It could also mean the small businesses that benefitted from the tax cut will now be wiped out (big business is able to more easily pass along these costs/reset prices while the smaller companies are usually not as easily able to do so). At a time of record inflation and supply chain issues, this will only make things worse.

 

I spent my life believing that people are good. I seldom lock my car and often don’t even lock my house. I prefer to strike deals in my office based on a man’s word rather than a contract….. I could believe all the hype I hear about the lack of morality in people these days, but you know what I have found out over the years? Most people really do want to do the right thing…… That goes for corporate entities too. I know the greedy exist. But by and large, most really are good people and don’t require a labor union to demand that they do the right thing.

 

The heck of it is this…. Once all the bills and salaries are paid, on a good month I can expect a 3% profit for my business each month. You raise my corporate taxes by an additional 7%, then I go into the red by 4%. Can’t stay in business very long losing money so what am I to do? Raise prices and cut out bonuses and cost of living increases potentially losing future business and good employees? This is the dilemma that every president, CFO and CEO in this nation will face…. And you know what tomorrow’s headlines read? I am a greedy SOB. This handwriting is already in the wall.

 

So, the gist is that we can never raise taxes on corporations or the rest of us will suffer.

Is that the overall message you are pushing?

 

Well, Joe.... It ain't a message. It's just the way it is..... If taxes need to be raised, then so be it. But in the midst of unrivaled inflation, that's just beyond foolish because it most certainly will add to increasing consumer costs.

 

So, what are the circumstances that would allow for raising taxes on corporations. I'm just curious what they might look like. I find them hard to imagine. Can outline what would be a good time to raise taxes?

THIS IS THE QUESTION I NEVER GET AN ANSWER TO.

By the way, one way the government tames inflation is by raising taxes.

 

I can see the correlation between raising taxes to quell inflation. But consider the state that most families are in currently. I do well and even my wife boo-hoos each time she goes to the grocery store. She has a budget that she sticks to and she is cutting serious corners in our groceries to get there. And we are doing alright. Imagine those families that struggle with multiple jobs to make ends meet. They are trying to deal with all these inflationary costs.... And now our president doubles down and places an additional cost on business that will also translate to the consumer and add additional burden to them. But the low information person sees a greedy corporation stealing from their dinner table..... All that aside, the man has shown me that he does not have Joe Average American anywhere in his thinking. Not even remotely and this is further proof of that to me...... When is a good time to raise my taxes? When government chooses to spend my hard earned money responsibly. And they have not demonstrated the ability to do that in quite some time.

 

So, it really isn't a matter of looking out for struggling families as much as it is about the tired old mantra that the government is spending my money on things I don't approve of which is all it usually comes down to every time anyway. I don't get to decide on every penny the government spends and neither do you. Simple fact. While I hate seeing so much of our taxes going to the miliary so disproportionally, there isn't much I can do about that.

But all that old nonsense aside, you nor anyone else has ever come up a good time to raise taxes on corporations. There has never been a bad time to lower corporate taxes so you would think that there would be a good time to raise corporate taxes as well. It only figures. But when your only belief is all taxes are a burden and they contribute nothing to the country other than pain and suffering for the working-class because any and all tax increases will be forced down the throats of working-class people, you are describing a broken economic system that by definition only favors the wealthiest individuals.

 

For Christ's sake this is another stupid conversation. The deficit still has to be paid back, by our children, their children and their children.

Tax the Billionaires. I don't give a damn. When their wampum/business interests relocate, don't piss and moan, because they will relocate their wealth.. Re-Distribution of wealth is one of the dumbest ideas the world of Economics ever devised.

While the BS here continues, Asia is again kicking our azz, with a Vietnam enterprise starting construction on an electric auto and battery factory, ON OUR SHORES. My God we are stupid. Their Backers? The Red Chinese.

Families, shlamilies... all better damn well worry about a world wide food source crisis. For the dumazz JNs and the In Search of a Better World Gene Wrights, if you think things are bad now with expenditures and the poor and disenfranchised are being ignored, wait until the poop hits the fan and our Military has to be forced to engage on 3 battlefronts, because of the JN and GW type of groupthink Save The Planet krap.

And that is all I have to say about that......

 

You hate seeing your taxes go to the military. I hate seeing my taxes go to pet projects that will prop up a politician with his voting base. Pork barrel projects that are buried in the midst of meaningful legislation. Closed door smoke filled room good old boy deals is how I see them. No, I do not get to decide what my money is used for, but I don't have to be pleased that it is being used as a bribe for congressional votes.

I know you don't buy into the concept that when my business earns more, my people earn more. And when my people earn more, they also pay more taxes. You have bought into the lie. But Joe, I am living proof that is precisely how it happens. I been doing it better than twenty years, not just reading what the talking heads say..... Not only will a rise in corporate rates cost the consumer, it will also cost my staff. Further, it will cost me future business because I competitively bid my work. So now the additional 7% imposed on me is not only negated, it will translate into lesser revenue for the fed. It's simple arithmetic, Joe. I been doing it all my professional life. No meme or pie chart can convince me otherwise. It is how business works. I am correct on this one.

 

Something you overlook GW, is that businesses don't grow simply by opening new branches. If a company opens new branches and raises wages simultaneously, it likely will be closing those new branches very shortly afterward. Growth comes only from increasing net revenues (Increases in gross revenues do not necessarily equate to growth), and or / from increasing market share in stable or growing markets. If a business passes the vast majority of its profits along to employees, it retains much less of what is needed to make an investment that expands its market.

Businesses capture market share by delivering more value than their competitors. Whether that value is delivered in the form of lower prices, greater customer convenience, better customer service, less wasteful packaging or other differentiators, they make investments that outsiders usually fail to recognize. Simply putting more money in the outstretched hand of an employee doesn't deliver more value to the customer, unless that employee delivers a commensurate increase in value. Moreover, the employer's business doesn't grow as a result of that increase in pay unless it gets paid by the customer for that improvement.

As concerns employees not benefiting from corporate investments, any growth from those investments compensates their employees in any of a number of ways . . . additional net revenue (bonuses), benefits (401K match), company-wide celebrations, and increased job security among others.

Don't be so quick to make business owners out to be the boogeymen . . . not even the owners of large businesses. While you doubtless have Gordon Gekko in mind when addressing this subject, there are precious few businessmen / women of that ilk, and it poorly represents reality.

It takes a special skill set to drive such levels of success and, as much as I'd like to make what those high performing business men / women do, and I certainly do not, I recognize that their outsized compensation is what the market bears . . . just like we, as consumers of their brand of product, pay crazy money to the likes of Gisele Bundchen, LeBron James, Madonna and Tom Brady.

Returning to what rank and file workers get from companies reinvesting rather than increasing their employee's pay year after year, has it not occurred to you that improvements in workers lives while holding costs reasonably constant are the direct result of increasing the value of products delivered, and represent an increase in the standard of living without an increase in income? Consider what happens when an employee figures out how to make the employer's product less costly and more reliable with fewer parts in an assembly, or perform better for the user . . . very real instances. That employee realizes no direct gain from such improvements, however all of the other products he / she consumes are undergoing similar improvements in order that their respective companies remain competitive in their own markets. The upshot of this is lower up-front cost / less likelihood of or lower frequency of replacement / better performance . . . and greater value.

Maybe part of union contracts should be the docking the pay of under-performing employees when workers fail to meet quotas?

I thought you were a Marxist, and not concerned with earning more than others . . . Evidently, you prefer free-market economics more than you let on . . . .

 

I don't think that is meant as a reply to me, and it is just that your post came after mine, but just to be sure, I am the biggest Military Budget increase fan that a JN or GW will ever meet.

The 814 Bill should be doubled, and doubled now.

 

Well said!

 

So, when are the factors right to raise taxes on corporations? And I am not talking about rinky-dink mom and pop places but large multinationals that only pay shareholders. Is there ever a time when a tax increase is merited? I still can't get a straight answer on this simple question. I wonder why?

 

Both the time and the amount by which taxes on corporations are raised will be right when taxes are similarly raised to the same percentage for all individuals.

 

Why would that make the slightest bit of sense? Does it just placate your sense of fairness while not answering the question?

Thanks to Republicans, many corporations already pay zero in taxes or actually get money back. I'll take that tax equation any old time but I just don't have the lobbyists and accounts to get the same treatment. Why is that fair?