Reevaluating Tax Breaks

If you could implement any change in the United States government what would it be?  This is more powerful question than most people take time to realize. Chances are if you asked one hundred different people you would get one hundred different answers.  One thing that could use some serious reevaluation would be the tax breaks we have in our current tax system, primarily for the big corporations.  Why you may ask, well the answer is simple, its because although some tax breaks are necessary and adequate, others are lenient and can be perceived as making a mockery of the system.

 This article titled 10 Facts About Corporate Taxes That Will Make Your Blood Boil  gives us a look into the confusing world of the corporate tax system. With the national deficit currently at an all time high, giving companies that are bringing in record revenues big tax breaks seem counter productive to our problem.  In the 1950's corporate taxes accounted for about 30% of all federal revenue, in 2006 it was just 6.6%. In other words that is down about five times less than what it was in the 1950's.  The United States has the highest corporate tax rate in the developed world at about 35%, so the question is why does it only generate less than 7% of federal revenue? Well the corporation have become experts at finding breaks in the system, primarily by means overseas.  Corporations will keep the revenues in off shore accounts therefore avoiding being taxed by the United States.

Looking deeper into the subject we can examine some individual companies and see what they paid in taxes.   General Electric made a total of 14.2 billion dollars in profits last year.  So how much did they pay in taxes to the U.S. Treasury?  According to the New York Times, not one penny was paid.  However, General Electric disputes this. How About Exxon Mobile?  They paid 15 billion in taxes in 2009, but not one penny went to the United States government. Boeing which receives billions in government subsidies every year, and has a contract with the United States government, not one penny was paid in taxes.  Did you pay taxes to federal government last year? If you were employed at anytime then yes you did, why should multi-billion dollar corporations posting record profits quarter after quarter not be asked to pay anything? Doing this would help to reduce the national deficit.

Now I am not saying that we need to completely do away with tax breaks, I just think the entire system needs to be broken down and reassembled to a more productive system that is fair for all of us, from the big corporation to the sixteen year olds working their first job at minimum wage.