GE paid 0% tax because the US govt decided to subsidize certain things that it wanted (mostly green energy related things), and implement that subsidy through t

GE paid 0% tax because the US govt decided to subsidize certain things that it wanted (mostly green energy related things), and implement that subsidy through the tax code via tax deductions and tax credits (because direct subsidies are politically unpalatable). GE promptly went and did exactly what the government wanted, which was invest in those nice expensive things, up to the point where all their taxes were wiped out. If your beef is that the US govt shouldn't subsidize things via the tax code, then that's a separate issue. If your beef is that GE should pay nonzero taxes, then you should view it as "GE paid X% taxes, and then did things it did not want to do unsubsidized in order to earn back -X% taxes as a reward." In which case, GE did pay taxes. They just then took advantage of an opportunity to earn back those taxes in exchange for investing in green energy related things.