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>This article really just emphasises the need to hold congress accountable for their actions... That's hard though, because ideology gets in the way. Everyone

>This article really just emphasises the need to hold congress accountable for their actions... That's hard though, because ideology gets in the way. Everyone has this, almost "quasi-religious", devotion to their politicians. So it becomes a lot easier to say, "Hey, look at all these rich banks and wealthy companies taking advantage of all their tailor made tax laws!", than it is to say, "OK guys, we have to sit down and get a list of everyone who voted for these advantageous tax laws that these rich companies are using." The one is more "sound bite"-y. It's easier to get people behind such a twitter storm. The other requires a performance review of each of our political leaders, which is just not the way we as Americans have typically operated. Not to mention the fact that it requires further action. You have a list, now what do you do with it? For instance, game theoretically speaking, it may be better to hold it over the current politician's head, than it would be to get rid of him/her immediately? Or maybe we just want to send a message, and get rid of all these men and women as soon as the law permits? I mean, it just opens up a lot of questions about how best to proceed. The other option, you know how to proceed. You just join in on the twitter storm so to speak.

atemerev 8y ago
OK, put me on your list, I generally vote in favor of lower taxes for corporations and individuals.
- zelon88 8y ago
  > I generally vote in favor of lower taxes for corporations and individuals. So like to have your cake and eat it too?
  - TAForObvReasons 8y ago
    The implication is a smaller government and fewer public services. We could theoretically eliminate social security / medicare and immediately put extra money in people's pockets, but that would be disastrous for a number of reasons.
  - civilian 8y ago
    How does that follow? You're assuming what kind of government services he votes for. He probably also favors less government spending.
    - AsyncAwait 8y ago
      * on social programs, not the military - would be my guess
      - RHSeeger 8y ago
        What makes you think that? There's a lot of people that would prefer money go to social programs rather than the military, but would prefer the spending on both be reduced by spending money more effectively. The Pentagon Wars is a prime example of how many people think the government spends it's money, "yes, that billions, with a B".
      - civilian 8y ago
        You're projecting real hard. The left has become insanely pro-war. It's really sad what the media is doing to Tulsi Gabbard, who's the only anti-war presidential candidate. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QlXhRBsOwpA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QlXhRBsOwpA
        AsyncAwait 8y ago
        > The left has become insanely pro-war No it has not, you're confusing neoliberals like Polosi with "the left", which is actually represented by people like Ro Khanna. The left, as in progressives, have been strong supporters of Tulsi and in fact she has backed Sanders over Clinton as well.
        civilian 8y ago
        That's fair. I mean, I did link to Jimmy Dore, I know there are some good anti-war progressives out there. (And, despite being a libertarian, I donated $100 to Tulsi's campaign as soon as she announced.) We might disagree with what "the left" means, which is fine. I use it to apply to "any Democrat or leftist-leaning independent". And it's just that Pelosi is freaking speaker of the house right now. The people and interests that are controlling the Democratic party are pro-war.
- justaaron 8y ago
  So, essentially small businesses and lower/middle income folks will pick up the slack on the missing revenue, and in general in terms of the tax-base tilt: In essence you are excusing a heavy tilt for the large global corporations that 1) constitute monopolies, in many cases, which are anti-innovation and kill innovation, actually. 2) are killing mom-and-pop small businesses left and right. "lower taxes for corporations and individuals" which one is it? I've never seen a lower federal budget, and the "small government" party has brought us 2 wars costing over $7 trillion over 18 years, and a perpetual war on an emotion that has caused an INCREASE in governmental size and spending, overall. Can you explain your stance a bit?
  - merpnderp 8y ago
    "essentially small businesses and lower/middle income folks will pick up the slack on the missing revenue" This is objectively untrue. The wealthiest taxpayers, who overwhelmingly make their money off of investments in companies like Amazon, pay nearly all of federal taxes. Just because Amazon doesn't pay taxes doesn't mean the people profiting off Amazon aren't paying taxes. A big reason why corporate taxes are dumb, since the money either grows the business or goes to individuals who pay taxes.
    - justaaron 8y ago
      This is objectively untrue. The wealthiest corporations and people overwhelmingly pay the LEAST share of taxes. Your shifting of the playing field smells like an excuse. 1) Whereas the federal budget has not been reduced. 2) Whereas the large monopolies and billionaires pay less (see: the $1.5 trillion tax cut for the top, and how it's hoarded rather than invested) tax therefore we are compensating for Amazon and Netflix etc paying less tax. Corporate taxes should grow with the size of the corporation. We should encourage small businesses as they spur innovation, mostly fail, and are the backbone of a stable economy, vs slave labor for globalized zombie corps like Amazon. https://www.forbes.com/sites/teresaghilarducci/2018/09/28/who-benefits-from-the-tax-cut-10-months-later/ https://www.forbes.com/sites/teresaghilarducci/2018/09/28/wh... https://www.cnbc.com/2018/06/20/now-we-know-how-major-corporations-are-spending-tax-cuts.html https://www.cnbc.com/2018/06/20/now-we-know-how-major-corpor... by all accounts, the opposite of an economic "pump" is when you give a tax cut to the already filthy rich. The tax base has been shifted to the middle and lower class. Plain and simple.
civilian 8y ago
I mean, I agree with your statement about ideology, but I disagree about everything else. Even if Amazon is not paying taxes on its corporate profits, it's still generating a boatload of tax money through income & payroll tax. And I think it's good to reduce corporate tax rates, to encourage our amazing economic engine to grow as fast as possible! https://taxfoundation.org/benefits-cutting-corporate-income-tax-rate/ https://taxfoundation.org/benefits-cutting-corporate-income-...
- moosey 8y ago
  Growth without limits pushes up against Climate Change and physics. We have believed over all these years that we could make more efficient use of the land of our planet than nature could, and we're going to learn that wasn't really the case at all. We need to balance our economic engine against the ecological one or we're doomed. "Tax Foundation", a site that craps on carbon taxes at best over and over, and only makes one suggestion: reduce taxes.
  - civilian 8y ago
    That's a fair criticism of the tax foundation-- I do think that a carbon tax would be a good market-driven approach to reducing CO2 emissions. I think we can provide a lot of energy without running into climate change and physics though. Nuclear energy is something I wish we did more to encourage. (It's a reliable emission-less source of energy!) Renewables are good, but we need battery tech to improve some more. (And the battery issue might also be another example of pushing against the limits of physics.)
justaaron 8y ago
Clearly, this is not the result of creative accounting, but merely displays just how SKEWED the playing field is in favor of large parasitic corporations, that kill innovation for each small company they acquire or quash. I don't see Amazon as rogue here, just as taking what they are allowed to take, and this is the problem, not the particular anecdote mentioned here in this articles healine.
- merpnderp 8y ago
  In what world is Amazon a large parasitic corporation that is killing innovation? I'm no Amazon fan, but I'd say they're dong more than their fair share of innovation, and given how many companies use their online stores and cloud services, they're the opposite of parasitic.
  - justaaron 8y ago
    1) Acquisitions of actually innovative tech corps and their products, which may be incorporated into Amazons products or simply killed. Microsoft is quite good at this. 2) Monopoly means no competition = bad for pricing, quality of service, and ultimately, the market. Are you unaware of federal anti-trust law and it's history?
JDiculous 8y ago
Yea I've always found it odd when people blame bad legislation on corporate lobbyists. Lobbyists don't pass laws, politicians do. Directing your anger towards lobbyists is literally giving your politicians a free pass. If a politician accepts a bribe, the politician should be the one taking the heat (along with the system that enabled this to happen), not the one giving the bribe. For example, tax filing in the U.S. could be as simple as you verifying the information they already have on you, saving you from the time and hassle of having to fill everything out yourself (often through software like TurboTax that costs money). Many countries already do this. But anytime I read an article on the subject, the narrative is that we're stuck with the status quo because companies like TurboTax with a vested financial interest in making tax filing difficult have fought tooth and nail to keep your tax filing difficult. Uh...no, this is not why we don't have simpler tax filing, it's because crooked and/or clueless politicians aren't voting it through Congress.
- JDiculous 8y ago
  Found another one in the news today: https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2019/2/13/18223836/paid-line-standing-congress-ocasio-cortez-homelessness https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2019/2/13/18223836/p... A Senator introduced a bill in 2007 to ban line-standing, a bill that never ended up leaving committee. "The line-standing industry quickly rallied against the proposal. The owner of Linestanding.com submitted testimony that argued McCaskill’s bill would eliminate “an industry that employs hundreds of entry-level workers, and instead creating positions for even more lobbyists, the bill would have the opposite effect of that intended. It wouldn’t change the composition of who ultimately sat in hearing rooms; it would simply increase costs for all involved.”" So politicians stop the passage of a law to ban line-standing, and we're supposed to feel that it's the lobbyists' fault rather than that of the politicians who prevented the bills passage? I guess politicians can do whatever they want and receive no accountability for their voting because the media has decided that politicians are immune and the lobbyists will take all the heat.
- senderista 8y ago
  I disagree. Politicians, like everyone else, simply respond to incentives. As long as the incentives aren't changed, it doesn't matter much who's in office. Changing the incentives in this case means limiting corporate contributions to politicians, for starters.

atemerev 8y ago

OK, put me on your list, I generally vote in favor of lower taxes for corporations and individuals.

zelon88 8y ago
> I generally vote in favor of lower taxes for corporations and individuals. So like to have your cake and eat it too?
- TAForObvReasons 8y ago
  The implication is a smaller government and fewer public services. We could theoretically eliminate social security / medicare and immediately put extra money in people's pockets, but that would be disastrous for a number of reasons.
- civilian 8y ago
  How does that follow? You're assuming what kind of government services he votes for. He probably also favors less government spending.
  - AsyncAwait 8y ago
    * on social programs, not the military - would be my guess
    - RHSeeger 8y ago
      What makes you think that? There's a lot of people that would prefer money go to social programs rather than the military, but would prefer the spending on both be reduced by spending money more effectively. The Pentagon Wars is a prime example of how many people think the government spends it's money, "yes, that billions, with a B".
    - civilian 8y ago
      You're projecting real hard. The left has become insanely pro-war. It's really sad what the media is doing to Tulsi Gabbard, who's the only anti-war presidential candidate. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QlXhRBsOwpA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QlXhRBsOwpA
      - AsyncAwait 8y ago
        > The left has become insanely pro-war No it has not, you're confusing neoliberals like Polosi with "the left", which is actually represented by people like Ro Khanna. The left, as in progressives, have been strong supporters of Tulsi and in fact she has backed Sanders over Clinton as well.
        civilian 8y ago
        That's fair. I mean, I did link to Jimmy Dore, I know there are some good anti-war progressives out there. (And, despite being a libertarian, I donated $100 to Tulsi's campaign as soon as she announced.) We might disagree with what "the left" means, which is fine. I use it to apply to "any Democrat or leftist-leaning independent". And it's just that Pelosi is freaking speaker of the house right now. The people and interests that are controlling the Democratic party are pro-war.
justaaron 8y ago
So, essentially small businesses and lower/middle income folks will pick up the slack on the missing revenue, and in general in terms of the tax-base tilt: In essence you are excusing a heavy tilt for the large global corporations that 1) constitute monopolies, in many cases, which are anti-innovation and kill innovation, actually. 2) are killing mom-and-pop small businesses left and right. "lower taxes for corporations and individuals" which one is it? I've never seen a lower federal budget, and the "small government" party has brought us 2 wars costing over $7 trillion over 18 years, and a perpetual war on an emotion that has caused an INCREASE in governmental size and spending, overall. Can you explain your stance a bit?
- merpnderp 8y ago
  "essentially small businesses and lower/middle income folks will pick up the slack on the missing revenue" This is objectively untrue. The wealthiest taxpayers, who overwhelmingly make their money off of investments in companies like Amazon, pay nearly all of federal taxes. Just because Amazon doesn't pay taxes doesn't mean the people profiting off Amazon aren't paying taxes. A big reason why corporate taxes are dumb, since the money either grows the business or goes to individuals who pay taxes.
  - justaaron 8y ago
    This is objectively untrue. The wealthiest corporations and people overwhelmingly pay the LEAST share of taxes. Your shifting of the playing field smells like an excuse. 1) Whereas the federal budget has not been reduced. 2) Whereas the large monopolies and billionaires pay less (see: the $1.5 trillion tax cut for the top, and how it's hoarded rather than invested) tax therefore we are compensating for Amazon and Netflix etc paying less tax. Corporate taxes should grow with the size of the corporation. We should encourage small businesses as they spur innovation, mostly fail, and are the backbone of a stable economy, vs slave labor for globalized zombie corps like Amazon. https://www.forbes.com/sites/teresaghilarducci/2018/09/28/who-benefits-from-the-tax-cut-10-months-later/ https://www.forbes.com/sites/teresaghilarducci/2018/09/28/wh... https://www.cnbc.com/2018/06/20/now-we-know-how-major-corporations-are-spending-tax-cuts.html https://www.cnbc.com/2018/06/20/now-we-know-how-major-corpor... by all accounts, the opposite of an economic "pump" is when you give a tax cut to the already filthy rich. The tax base has been shifted to the middle and lower class. Plain and simple.

civilian 8y ago

I mean, I agree with your statement about ideology, but I disagree about everything else. Even if Amazon is not paying taxes on its corporate profits, it's still generating a boatload of tax money through income & payroll tax. And I think it's good to reduce corporate tax rates, to encourage our amazing economic engine to grow as fast as possible! https://taxfoundation.org/benefits-cutting-corporate-income-tax-rate/ https://taxfoundation.org/benefits-cutting-corporate-income-...

moosey 8y ago
Growth without limits pushes up against Climate Change and physics. We have believed over all these years that we could make more efficient use of the land of our planet than nature could, and we're going to learn that wasn't really the case at all. We need to balance our economic engine against the ecological one or we're doomed. "Tax Foundation", a site that craps on carbon taxes at best over and over, and only makes one suggestion: reduce taxes.
- civilian 8y ago
  That's a fair criticism of the tax foundation-- I do think that a carbon tax would be a good market-driven approach to reducing CO2 emissions. I think we can provide a lot of energy without running into climate change and physics though. Nuclear energy is something I wish we did more to encourage. (It's a reliable emission-less source of energy!) Renewables are good, but we need battery tech to improve some more. (And the battery issue might also be another example of pushing against the limits of physics.)

justaaron 8y ago

Clearly, this is not the result of creative accounting, but merely displays just how SKEWED the playing field is in favor of large parasitic corporations, that kill innovation for each small company they acquire or quash. I don't see Amazon as rogue here, just as taking what they are allowed to take, and this is the problem, not the particular anecdote mentioned here in this articles healine.

merpnderp 8y ago
In what world is Amazon a large parasitic corporation that is killing innovation? I'm no Amazon fan, but I'd say they're dong more than their fair share of innovation, and given how many companies use their online stores and cloud services, they're the opposite of parasitic.
- justaaron 8y ago
  1) Acquisitions of actually innovative tech corps and their products, which may be incorporated into Amazons products or simply killed. Microsoft is quite good at this. 2) Monopoly means no competition = bad for pricing, quality of service, and ultimately, the market. Are you unaware of federal anti-trust law and it's history?

JDiculous 8y ago

Yea I've always found it odd when people blame bad legislation on corporate lobbyists. Lobbyists don't pass laws, politicians do. Directing your anger towards lobbyists is literally giving your politicians a free pass. If a politician accepts a bribe, the politician should be the one taking the heat (along with the system that enabled this to happen), not the one giving the bribe. For example, tax filing in the U.S. could be as simple as you verifying the information they already have on you, saving you from the time and hassle of having to fill everything out yourself (often through software like TurboTax that costs money). Many countries already do this. But anytime I read an article on the subject, the narrative is that we're stuck with the status quo because companies like TurboTax with a vested financial interest in making tax filing difficult have fought tooth and nail to keep your tax filing difficult. Uh...no, this is not why we don't have simpler tax filing, it's because crooked and/or clueless politicians aren't voting it through Congress.

JDiculous 8y ago
Found another one in the news today: https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2019/2/13/18223836/paid-line-standing-congress-ocasio-cortez-homelessness https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2019/2/13/18223836/p... A Senator introduced a bill in 2007 to ban line-standing, a bill that never ended up leaving committee. "The line-standing industry quickly rallied against the proposal. The owner of Linestanding.com submitted testimony that argued McCaskill’s bill would eliminate “an industry that employs hundreds of entry-level workers, and instead creating positions for even more lobbyists, the bill would have the opposite effect of that intended. It wouldn’t change the composition of who ultimately sat in hearing rooms; it would simply increase costs for all involved.”" So politicians stop the passage of a law to ban line-standing, and we're supposed to feel that it's the lobbyists' fault rather than that of the politicians who prevented the bills passage? I guess politicians can do whatever they want and receive no accountability for their voting because the media has decided that politicians are immune and the lobbyists will take all the heat.
senderista 8y ago
I disagree. Politicians, like everyone else, simply respond to incentives. As long as the incentives aren't changed, it doesn't matter much who's in office. Changing the incentives in this case means limiting corporate contributions to politicians, for starters.