Should businesses leaving America have to pay an "expatriation tax"?
Walt
2012/07/18 06:35:22
American citizens are viewed as chattel for tax purposes. We are the only citizens in the world who are expected to pay taxes to our home country when we relocate or take jobs abroad. Even those who go to an American embassy on foreign soil to renounce their citizenship and formally declare themselves citizens of another country are required to pay an Expatriation Tax.
Since the Supreme Court now recognizes corporations as people, should corporations be required to pay the equivalent of an expatriation tax when they relocate to a foreign country?
Since the Supreme Court now recognizes corporations as people, should corporations be required to pay the equivalent of an expatriation tax when they relocate to a foreign country?
Top Opinion
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Hula girl - Friends not Fol... 2012/07/18 07:49:58
+11No but why not just make America more business friendly so they wouldn't be forced to leave.
(I kind of misrepresented a little bit. I left out the part where expatriation taxes only apply to people leaving with in excess of $2 million, but I figured it evens out. Most businesses leaving the country have more than that.)
They got while the getting was good. I can't blame them for wanting to keep it rather than have greedy politicians be poor conservators of their money.
Tax his land,
Tax his bed,
Tax the table
At which he's fed.
Tax his tractor,
Tax his mule,
Teach him taxes
Are the rule.
Tax his work,
Tax his pay,
He works for peanuts
Anyway!
Tax his cow,
Tax his goat,
Tax his pants,
Tax his coat.
Tax his ties,
Tax his shirt,
Tax his work,
Tax his dirt.
Tax his tobacco,
Tax his drink,
Tax him if he
Tries to think.
Tax his cigars,
Tax his beers,
If he cries
Tax his tears.
Tax his car,
Tax his gas,
Find other ways
To tax his ass.
Tax all he has
Then let him know
That you won't be done
Till he has no dough.
When he screams and hollers,
Then tax him some more,
Tax him till
He's good and sore.
Then tax his coffin,
Tax his grave,
Tax the sod in
Which he's laid.
Put these words
Upon his tomb,
"Taxes drove me
to my doom..."
When he's gone,
Do not relax,
Its time to apply
The inheritance tax.
If you were to tax this, no foreign investment would come into the US.
If it is a matter of nailing someone, why not make any company that makes more than 50% of it's products or services overseas be treated as a foreign corporation. Pay tariffs. That would be Walmart, Microsoft and most others. Most of these corporations have foreign subsidiaries and those profits never see US shores and they never pay US taxes (Haliburton, Microsoft, Exxon, HP, ...most of them)...they don't repatriate their profits.
Yet you would have to pay an expatriation tax. Corporations which are now considered human beings by the court system do not have to pay the same tax you would have to pay.
(I say "stupidly" because businesses like Shell Oil opening plants in Russia often find they no longer own their own plants anymore and after they're kicked out, their people sometimes don't get to come back to the U.S. if they are of the host country's ethnic background.)
Since the Supreme Court has stated that corporations are people, why should they be held to a lower standard than you or me when they decide to leave?
You would have to pay an expatriation tax. You are a person. They do not have to pay an expatriation tax. They too are considered a person.
Are you ignorant to the fact that any person who lives and works outside the US for a 12 month period pays no income tax on that income to the US?
And stop trying to make personal attacks.
1. I do not think any American should have to pay taxes on money made abroad, but I can see that is not likely to change.
2. I do not think corporations are people.
3. I do not like seeing businesses leaving the U.S., going abroad, and awarding American jobs to foreigners, expecially not GE, which did not pay any taxes last year, nor GM largely moving operations to China after accepting large scale bailouts from American taxpayers.
4. However, if I were to relocate overseas and expatriate (something I am not going to do), I would be expected to pay an expatriation tax. Since corporations are now considered people, why should they not be held to the same standard as me and you?
That's my point.
2. You are wrong, I as myself, have been incorporated since I was 28. I am a person and I am a corporation.
3. Why is any job an "American" job. When you have corporations beholden to government influence, that means government is too big.
4. Why would you expect to pay an expatriate tax? Why should you be taxed to exercise your right to leave? We are soveriegn individuals, free to leave, there should be no expected punishment for renouncing your citizenship.
I do not agree with the expatriation tax, but the law is the law. I do agree we should be free to come and go at-will, but apparently that is not the case.
What I am suggesting is that if corporations (I'm not referring to LLC's) are actually people, then they have to obey the same laws everyone else obeys.