It's insanity because it's based on the misconception that taxing companies is somehow different from taxing people. What do you think those companies will do if you increase their taxes? Roll over and just fork it over even if it puts them in the red? No. They're going to raise their prices, and/or cut their costs to compensate.

Ultimately, all taxes are paid for by taxpayers. Whether it's directly through income and sales taxes, or indirectly through corporate taxes which get passed on to customers as price increases and employees as pay cuts (or smaller pay raises). The end result is the same - less money for taxpayers, more money for the government.

You can argue that we need more taxation. But never make the mistake of thinking that taxing corporations has zero impact on taxpayers. It has exactly the same economic effect as directly raising taxes on taxpayers. The only thing that gets changed is who gets blamed (people curse the companies for raising their prices, instead of the government for collecting so many taxes).

* Numerical example for people who still don't get it. Say you make $50k/yr and pay $10k/yr in taxes, thus leaving you with $40k/yr to spend on yourself. The country changes law eliminating income tax, and getting all funding from corporate taxes instead. Do you think you'll now get $50k/yr to spend? No. Companies now have to pay an extra $10k/yr per citizen in taxes. So either your pay gets cut to $40k/yr, or prices increase 20% which after adjusting for inflation leaves you with $40k/yr just like before. You see, average real income is purely a function of productivity. And changing how taxes are collected doesn't change average productivity per capita. So where from the economy you extract taxes can't change the amount of real take-home pay. It's all just shell game.

Sounds like a plan to cut off your nose to spiderface. Never spiderface: no good can come of that.

Yup.

And this is about as good as its going to get, since we don't know the exact initial conditions (temp. and relative humidity).

Episodes of My Drunk Kitchen don't count...

I wonder how the Mystery Goo is going to behave in that orbit.

Were you joking? Jails in many cities in California now require you to pay for your stay, unless you want to be shipped to a state prison instead. We're not quite the statist utopia yet, but Cali comes close.

Yes, yes, we've heard it all before, it's those 99% of police who are bad apples that give the other 1% a bad name. Totally unfair of me to overgeneralize from several such occurrences in my actual life when arguing about someone else's fantasy.

Were you proposing a system? Or confused about today's system? It's an interesting proposal, but of course dividends are double-taxed today.

Overall, though, I think people are confused about why a corporation would "hoard" money in bad times. The greater the uncertainty, the greater the reserves needed to see you through a couple standard deviations of possible futures. We all benefit from corporations not going under if bad times continue, after all. So, unless you're actually a fan of bailouts, perhaps cut a company some slack when they build some reserves when facing uncertain times?

The executives want all the most important jobs close to them. All the top-tier engineering jobs, all the HR, product managers, senior corporate managers and other "useless overhead" jobs, all the jobs that pay really well tend to be where the corporate HQ is.

Now, now Fidel. Calm down. You're retired now and there's a Canasta tournment this afternoon in the day room.

Of course he has no expectation that it will pass. In fact, he'd be horrified if it did! He absolutely does NOT want it to pass, because it's pure theater, designed to allow lefty politicians to say in advertisements that their opponents hate education spending, etc. It's 100% empty, completely disingenuous rhetoric, and should have the bright light of day on it from the beginning.

Counter example: churches.

Labor doesn't pay taxes either. Take more out of my paycheck and I'll buy less of your (corporate) junk.

It's silly to think of someone or something paying taxes. Its all a cycle and taxes represent a drag or inefficiency in the transfer of funds no matter where they are applied. Common sense (and equity) demands that we spread the tax burden across as many transfer events as possible. That means personal as well as corporate income taxes.

The point that many people are missing about this 'Obama Tax' is that it appears to be a federal tax on wealth, not transfers. And that is problematic. State and local governments have various forms of wealth taxes (property), but the feds do not. Even inheritance and capital gains taxes are triggered by transfer events. This makes the proposed tax a disturbing precedent.

We "must" tax the corporation? What kind of goal is that? Do you see the end-goal of a government as being to tax everything it can as much as it can? Many people do, it seems.

How about, instead, the government works to grow the US economy as much as possible. More jobs, more income, the tax revenue thing will work out OK in the end.

No, you fool, how about we have more jobs here instead of your befuddled plan? Only a statist cares more about taxes than the health of the nation.

Maybe you should use a meme generator for that one?

Or, consider the reality of it. Cops who pull people over while driving unmarked cars are completely used to not being trusted - by anyone, of any color. I have a great relationship with the cops I know, and have never had a bad moment with any I don't. My wife and I are lily white, but I'd never encourage her to pull over for an unmarked car anywhere but in a very populated spot, and ideally in front of the local police station. I do not trust unmarked cars, and there's good reason for that. Great news bit just this morning, where a cop-impersonating douche in a white Crown Vic pulled over (wait for it!) an off duty cop. Good one. He got to flash his badge, and was packing (guy drove off, but was promptly caught and arrested). What do the rest of us get to do?

Meanwhile, back in your race-card-playing department: there's a reason that cops in rougher neighborhoods don't EVER do normal traffic stops in unmarked cars. Cops in marked cruisers get attacked, run over, shot at and otherwise put in peril all the time. And those are guys rolling in plainly marked cars, wearing uniforms. I'll have to look around to see if there are any stats on basic traffic stops in marked vs. unmarked cars in high crime areas. My sense, from talking to people in that line of work, is that it's very rare. Unmarked cars in those areas aren't about traffic citations - they're usually working warrants, drug mules, trafficking, that sort of thing.

In the mean time, if you get the lights on you from an unmarked car, and it doesn't matter what color you are, proceed at the speed limit to the nearest station, or look for a marked car and honk to get their attention (if the unmarked is real, the officer in the marked car will already know what's going on, and will usually join in the stop to help protect the unmarked guy and to make sure anyone seeing the scene understands it's legit).

Did you have an argument to go with that assertion?

No system of taxation has ever gotten federal revenues above 19% of GDP for long, and corporate taxes are a fairly small portion of federal revenue to begin with. We only tax corporations out of some sense of social justice, not because it's a useful way to fund the government. The key ingredient to "saving the country" is to spend less that we actually take in in federal revenue. We can hypothesize all day about what might happen with some new tax plan, but long term if we don't spend less than we make, it will end in tears.

The proper goal and aim of the government is not to feather its own nest with larger taxes in the first place, but to grow the economy! I give 0 fucks whether corporations pay taxes here or not, the important thing is whether the incentives are to have jobs here or not - especially well-paying high-skill jobs! And each and every law that makes it more expensive to do business in America detracts from that,

But perhaps you had an argument along those lines?