288 companies in the Fortune 500 that registered consistent profit every year from 2008 to 2012. Those 288 profitable corporations paid an “effective federal income tax rate of just 19.4 percent over the five-year period — far less than the statutory 35 percent tax rate,” according to Citizens for Tax Justice .
93 of the analyzed companies paid an effective tax rate below 10 percent in that timespan.
26 of the most powerful American corporations – such as Boeing, General Electric, and Verizon – paid no federal income tax from 2008 to 2012.
Tax subsidies for the 288 companies over the five years totaled a staggering $364 billion, including $56 billion in 2008, $70 billion in 2009, $80 billion in 2010, $87 billion in 2011, and $70 billion in 2012,” CTJ states. “These amounts are the difference between what the companies would have paid if their tax bills equaled 35 percent of their profits and what they actually paid.”
Wells Fargo received the largest amount of tax subsidies - $21.6 billion - in the five-year period. The banking giant was joined in the top ten on that list by the likes of AT&T, ExxonMobil, J.P Morgan Chase, and Wal-Mart.
The sectors with the lowest effective corporate tax rates over the five-year period were utilities (2.9 percent), industrial machinery (4.3 percent), telecommunications (9.8 percent), oil, gas and pipelines (14.4 percent), transportation (16.4 percent), aerospace and defense (16.7 percent) and financial (18.8 percent).
Lax taxation among the most powerful US corporations comes amid an aggressive push by lobby and trade groups on Capitol Hill to reduce the federal corporate income tax rate, based on the claim that our corporate tax is uncompetitively high compared to other developed nations even though two thirds paid higher corporate tax rates to foreign governments where they operate than they paid in the U.S. on their U.S. profits.
Corporations possess the ability to "defer" taxes on offshore profits; use executive stock options that reduce taxes by "generating phantom 'costs'” the companies don't really incur and accelerated depreciation opportunities.
93 of the analyzed companies paid an effective tax rate below 10 percent in that timespan.
26 of the most powerful American corporations – such as Boeing, General Electric, and Verizon – paid no federal income tax from 2008 to 2012.
Tax subsidies for the 288 companies over the five years totaled a staggering $364 billion, including $56 billion in 2008, $70 billion in 2009, $80 billion in 2010, $87 billion in 2011, and $70 billion in 2012,” CTJ states. “These amounts are the difference between what the companies would have paid if their tax bills equaled 35 percent of their profits and what they actually paid.”
Wells Fargo received the largest amount of tax subsidies - $21.6 billion - in the five-year period. The banking giant was joined in the top ten on that list by the likes of AT&T, ExxonMobil, J.P Morgan Chase, and Wal-Mart.
The sectors with the lowest effective corporate tax rates over the five-year period were utilities (2.9 percent), industrial machinery (4.3 percent), telecommunications (9.8 percent), oil, gas and pipelines (14.4 percent), transportation (16.4 percent), aerospace and defense (16.7 percent) and financial (18.8 percent).
Lax taxation among the most powerful US corporations comes amid an aggressive push by lobby and trade groups on Capitol Hill to reduce the federal corporate income tax rate, based on the claim that our corporate tax is uncompetitively high compared to other developed nations even though two thirds paid higher corporate tax rates to foreign governments where they operate than they paid in the U.S. on their U.S. profits.
Corporations possess the ability to "defer" taxes on offshore profits; use executive stock options that reduce taxes by "generating phantom 'costs'” the companies don't really incur and accelerated depreciation opportunities.
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