Capitalism at its finest:
1. Bank of America took $336 billion in bailouts in 2009, but in 2010, flush with $4.4 billion in profits, it paid no taxes. Even Forbes magazine asked, how is that possible? Probably thanks to their 115 offshore tax havens.
2. Boeing just received $35 billion from our government to build 179 airborne tankers, but despite nearly $10 billion in profits from 2008 to 2010, it too paid no taxes, again thanks to foreign tax havens.
3. Citicorp took $476 billion from the bailout and then made monster profits in 2010, yet it paid no taxes, thanks to 427 subsidiaries in tax havens like the Cayman Islands and Hong Kong.
4. Exxon/Mobil, received huge oil subsidies from the government and earned $45 billion in 2009 but paid no taxes, again thanks to stashing profits in places like the Bahamas and Singapore.
5. Google utilizes a technique that moves most of its income through Ireland and Netherlands to Bermuda, making its tax rate 2.3 percent.
6. Mega Pharmaceuticals Merck earned $9 billion in profits and paid no taxes in 2010, while Pfizer (largest drug maker) owed $10 billion in taxes but found the necessary loopholes to pay no taxes, thanks to its offshore subsidiaries in places like Luxembourg and the Isle of Jersey.
7. News Corporation, Rupert Murdoch’s media monolith that owns Fox News avoids paying American taxes through its 152 subsidiaries in tax havens from the British Virgin Islands to Hong Kong.
8. Verizon, despite making $24.2 billion in pre-tax US income, paid no taxes and actually claimed a federal refund of $1.3 billion for the last two years, again all thanks to those offshore subsidiaries.
9. Wells Fargo, the fourth largest bank in the US, which took $107 billion in bailouts, wrote off all its losses by acquiring Wachovia, thus paying no taxes. Yet its CEO earned $5.6 million in cash for his salary and $13 million in stock.
A Potential Alternative providing Humanity can get its head out of its ass. Humanity needs to redefine it's meaning for the word "reward" I believe.... I like the premise of the following clip and even as it stands, I believe it to be a much better and more evolved option that the garbage we've created and managed to sustain much to 80% of the world's population's poverty and famine....
How about no excuses for war, economic based crimes, and communal collective evolution of our species as reward for starters? How about the certainty that every human being on earth has access to clean food, water, air, shelter, love and freedom of movement? Those are pretty motivational and rewarding to me....
How about no excuses for war, economic based crimes, and communal collective evolution of our species as reward for starters? How about the certainty that every human being on earth has access to clean food, water, air, shelter, love and freedom of movement? Those are pretty motivational and rewarding to me....
Humanity has to first evolve itself passed its own ego to be able to even conceive a notion of a higher-self functioning society....
