Corporate Taxes

Maybe someday I will be smart enough to figure our government out. I heard last evening about <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2004/04/06/business/06tax.html?ex=1081828800&en=afb6d5da8edbd12b&ei=5062&partner=GOOGLE">2/3 of companies in US owe no taxes</a>. These companies managed to pay no taxes while the economy was "booming" from 1996 to 2000. <br />n<br />n<i>"there's no question that we have all sorts of complicated provisions in the tax code that make it very easy for clever lawyers and accountants to structure a company's affairs that makes it easier for them to avoid taxes."</i><br />n<br />nThis appears to me to be what the problem is. The governments overly complicated tax provisions let companies avoid paying taxes. How do these companies get these tax provisions into law? Lobby congressmen. Hell of a return on investment for them. Lobby (buy off) a few congressman and avoid millions in taxes.<br />n<!–more–><br />nYou don't believe me then look at <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A55868-2004Apr6.html">this story</a> in the Washington Post (free subscription required). Here is a story about how the Senate and House placed provisions in the new transportation bill, which in itself has way too much pork barrel spending in it, giving billions, yes I said billions, of dollars worth of tax breaks to companies in the new transportation bill. <br />n<br />nOK, lets set the record straight. I do not support higher taxes. As a small business operator and rancher I pay plenty of taxes all ready. It is my second biggest single expenses on my books every year which means that it has a significant effect on the profitability of the ranch. Saying all that, I don't understand how are government seems to think it can keep running every year by increasing spending and cutting taxes. My opinion is that the big companies keep buying them off, Republicans and Democrats alike, and the congressmen keep paying off in return. Eventually this house of cards they are building is going to collapse. It's going to get real ugly around here when it does.<br />n<br />n<b>The genius of our ruling class is that it has kept a majority of the people from ever questioning the inequity of a system where most people drudge along, paying heavy taxes for which they get nothing in return. Gore Vidal</b>