[Graeme]

Rubbish. Tax avoidance is part of oil company culture. Just google the topic; the internet is full of it.

[KaiserJeep]

Rubbish. Tax avoidance is part of oil company culture. Just google the topic; the internet is full of it.

Tax avoidance is part of ALL corporate culture. If a corporation's executives were so incompetent as to "pay their fair share" of taxes, the shareholders would immediately vote them from office and they would never work under their real names again.

Remember we live in an oligarchy. The oligarchs are those who can afford to buy the legislation that gives favorable tax treatment to them. In short, a mixture of "old money" rich people and those with new corporate wealth.

"....as it was in the beginning is now and ever shall be, world without end."
-or-
...at least as long as currency has value. Which may not be forever. When things get bad, you cannot trade money for food.

[ROCKMAN]

KP - "Tax avoidance is part of ALL corporate culture." Just corporations??? A quick poll: how many here do not take every tax deduction available to them? And toss in your reason for giving more than "your fair share".

[KaiserJeep]

ROCKMAN, I would go further and say that everyone should start to roll back their taxes, to correct the "government overshoot" Let us start by everybody doing an honest tax return, and then sending them 75% of the amount owed.

Then we hang any politician who votes for deficit spending.

I think that will work.

[rockdoc123]

Just google the topic; the internet is full of it.

it is also full of alien abductions and all manner of conspiracy theories.....because it is on the internet doesn't make it true.

As to tax avoidance everyone whether they work for oil companies or solar panel manufacturing plants look for anyway possible to mitigate their tax burden. I do it every year through managing investments into areas that have lower taxes, claiming every last deduction I legally can. And those who aren't doing the same are quite frankly stupid. The key phrase here is "legally".

[Graeme]

The Internet is full of liars and trolls too.

Tax evasion is illegal. Legal tax avoidance is unacceptable.

[Graeme]

Obama doubles down on threat to act against 'tax inversions' by US firms

In the wake of a rare tactical victory for the White House, Barack Obama on Wednesday evening defended his threat to use controversial presidential powers to prevent companies from avoiding US taxes.

In his first public comments on the subject since Walgreens amended a takeover deal that would have moved the enlarged company to a lower tax jurisdiction in the UK or Switzerland, the president warned other US companies considering so-called “tax inversion” strategies that he would look at fresh ways to take executive action to clamp down on the growing practice.

Although the administration’s legal authority to change tax rules without legislation from Congress is limited, the threat of White House interference hung over Walgreens’ takeover talks with smaller UK partner Alliance Boots and appears to have been a major factor in the company’s decision to keep the combined group’s headquarters in Chicago after it completes the deal.

Attempts to tackle the issue in Congress are stalled and Republicans have attacked Obama’s growing use of executive action in place of legislation as a breach of the constitution, and launched a lawsuit against him out of the House of Representatives over the issue.

At a press conference in Washington on Thursday, an undeterred president said he would continue to seek to counter future inversion strategies just as aggressively and stood by his use of executive action as a tactic to deal with Republican opposition in Congress.

theguardian

How to stop the inversion perversion

The real solution is to lower the corporate rate, eliminate tax breaks and move America from a worldwide system to a territorial one. Barack Obama has proposed a reform that cuts the rate to 28% but keeps the worldwide reach. Dave Camp, a Republican congressman, has plumped for 25%, the OECD average, and a shift to a territorial system, instead.

It should be possible to bridge the differences. But both sides have tied the subject to other issues. Mr Obama insists that corporate-tax reform must also raise more money to spend on things like public infrastructure, which the Republicans oppose; they, in turn, want to package it with cuts in personal tax rates, which Mr Obama is loth to accept. Thus, nothing happens.

The two sides should drop their conditions and hammer out a stand-alone corporate-tax reform that reduces the rate and broadens the base. Until then, expect the line-up of corporate migrants to grow.

economist

[Graeme]

Treasury cracks down on corporate tax 'inversions'

he Treasury Department will crack down on so-called tax "inversions," targeting companies that try to avoid taxes by moving their headquarters overseas.

Treasury Secretary Jacob Lew said the new rules would help close what he called a "glaring loophole in the U.S. tax code" in which U.S. companies acquire foreign businesses and then switch their citizenship to avoid paying U.S. taxes.

One rule, for example, would make it more difficult to for a smaller foreign company to take over a larger U.S. company, strengthening a requirement that the American-owned company be less than 80% of the new company.

Another rule would target so-called "hopscotch" loans, in which companies get around taxes on dividends by instead distributing their earnings in the form of a loan to the foreign company.

The Treasury Department is still fleshing out the details on the new guidance, but is putting companies on notice that deals that take place after Tuesday will be subject to the new tax rules.

"For some companies considering deals, today's actions may mean that those transactions no longer make economic sense," Lew said.

But Lew said the Treasury Department was also careful to target cases where companies were merging to avoid taxes. "Genuine cross-border mergers make the U.S. economy stronger by enabling U.S. companies to invest overseas and encouraging foreign investment to flow into the United States," he said.

usatoday