Trump is Right to Blow Up the Fed

[Tsing Tao]

By assets so far we’ve only discussed stocks and houses, so I have to assume these are what you are referring.

Let’s talk about the market because while I’m sure you’re going to disagree with me I don’t view it as completely futile altogether.

The market is overvalued buuuuuut not because of the fed but because of the tax bill.

This market is almost solely pumped off of buybacks. All the smart money is on the sidelines waiting for the next recession coming in a year or so.

Oh, come on. The tax bill drove the valuation of the market? Give me a freakin' break. What rubbish. I'm not saying the market didn't move up because of the tax bill, but this:

IS NOT because of the tax bill. Holy Christ, man.

Now will a dovish fed delay the inevitable, maybe. Will it pad profits immediately, yes. Will it be harmful when the next recession hits, very much so.

? I can't tell if you're arguing with me or agreeing. Can you please focus a bit more and clarify your position?

Now to their balance sheet, a record by what metric?

How about the actual balance of the actual balance sheet?

By the way, the chart has to be logarithmic because the amount has grown so massively that a non-logarithmic graph would look like a meteoric line if it weren't.

Asking if I believe “all of this happened in the last two years” is just silly. As a leader you have to handle to challenges in front of you as they come. Whether it’s the macro economy or anything else.

I don’t know if you’ve ever owned a business but everyday is a new challenge. Prices go up, products change, regulations change, law suits come in, you name it. Almost everyday it’s something threatening you. You have to be able to meet the challenges and overcome to prosper.

Trump is clearly causing more of the same problem, but to suggest he should fix everything in the macro economy in two years is utterly ridiculous - like most of your posts in this thread. As for whether I have business experience, please. I am the Chief Financial Officer for a company with revenues just under $1B.

Trump doesn’t have a “winning” mentality. He’s a cheater by nature and he is unable to meet the challenges before this nation. As such, I do not have faith in his administration’s ability to meet the macroeconomic challenges of this nation.

Yeah, yeah. Orange man bad and all that. I get it.

But this may surprise you, the macroeconomic situation was good when he took over. We were certainly on a better course than we had been for quite some time. We have squandered that in a little more than 2 years.

It would surprise me unless you told me this was how you were describing the economy on another planet. None of this happened in the last two years. It just got worse. Asset prices are more overvalued. Everything happened long before Trump got here. Your partisanship has blinded you - as always.

O and as to your assertion every president since Nixon has pressured the fed in some way, again, where’s your proof or at least hypothesis of how it was done?

Presidents regularly meet with the Federal Reserve Chief. If you think they don't put pressure on them during this meeting...well, I was going to say you're clueless, but I think we've established that already.

 

[Spike Trader]

He may be right, but there will be consequences, some known and some to be revealed as things evolve. There will be pain.

60 Top Corporations Paid $0 Federal Taxes Under Trump Tax Law
Amazon, Chevron, Netflix, Eli Lilly, IBM and General Motors are reaping tax cut benefits and paying nothing.


President Donald Trump’s new tax law aided corporations so radically that twice as many companies paid no federal taxes whatsoever in 2018, despite billions of dollars in profit, according to a new study.

Amazon, Netflix, Chevron, Eli Lilly, Delta Airlines, General Motors, IBM and Goodyear were among the tax-free corporate titans, according to an analysis by the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy, a Washington think tank, released Thursday.

The study found that 60 of some of the largest publicly held companies paid no taxes — compared with an average of about 30 each year from 2008 to 2015, before Trump and congressional Republicans passed the tax law that took effect in 2018. The measure heavily favors corporations and the wealthy.

The analysis is based on 2018 financial filings of the country’s largest 560 publicly held companies.

The companies that paid nothing in taxes were “able to zero out their federal income taxes on $79 billion in U.S. pretax income,” according to the study, first reported by the Center for Public Integrity and NBC News.

Corporations reaped the benefits of a tax rate slashed from 35% to 21% in Trump’s tax law, and exploited various deductions, tax credits and rebates.

“Instead of paying $16.4 billion in taxes, as the new 21 percent corporate tax rate requires, these companies enjoyed a net corporate tax rebate of $4.3 billion, blowing a $20.7 billion hole in the federal budget last year,” the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy report says.

Farm equipment manufacturer John Deere, for example, reported earning $2.15 billion in U.S. income before taxes. It owed no U.S. taxes in 2018 and reported the government owes the company $268 million because of various deductions and credits, the report says.

The cut in the corporate tax rate alone will save corporations $1.35 trillion over the next 10 years, according to the Joint Committee on Taxation.

As for the nation, revenues from the corporate tax fell by 31% in 2018 to $204 billion.

“This was a more precipitous decline than in any year of normal economic growth in U.S. history,” Matthew Gardner, Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy senior fellow, wrote in the report.

Trump insisted before his law was passed that the corporate tax cut would pay for itself. He argued that the giveback would trigger a boom in business operations that would lead to increased taxes on ballooning income, which would plug the giant hole in the budget.

But it hasn’t worked out that way. The nation’s budget deficit is now the biggest in history.

During his campaign, Trump vowed to eliminate the $19.9 trillion national debt in eight years. Instead, it jumped 41.8 percent in just the first four months of this fiscal year (which runs from October through September).

An April Government Accountability Office report called the “federal government’s current fiscal path ... unsustainable.” The cost of interest alone on the national debt runs $896 million each day.

Trump’s top economic adviser Larry Kudlow insisted Thursday that “economic growth” has already “paid for a good chunk” of the tax cuts. The budget outlook is “not as bad as many people say,” he said.

Bloomberg pointed out that Kudlow’s declaration defies data from his own administration.

 

[Tsing Tao]

60 Top Corporations Paid $0 Federal Taxes Under Trump Tax Law
Amazon, Chevron, Netflix, Eli Lilly, IBM and General Motors are reaping tax cut benefits and paying nothing.


President Donald Trump’s new tax law aided corporations so radically that twice as many companies paid no federal taxes whatsoever in 2018, despite billions of dollars in profit, according to a new study.

Amazon, Netflix, Chevron, Eli Lilly, Delta Airlines, General Motors, IBM and Goodyear were among the tax-free corporate titans, according to an analysis by the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy, a Washington think tank, released Thursday.

The study found that 60 of some of the largest publicly held companies paid no taxes — compared with an average of about 30 each year from 2008 to 2015, before Trump and congressional Republicans passed the tax law that took effect in 2018. The measure heavily favors corporations and the wealthy.

The analysis is based on 2018 financial filings of the country’s largest 560 publicly held companies.

The companies that paid nothing in taxes were “able to zero out their federal income taxes on $79 billion in U.S. pretax income,” according to the study, first reported by the Center for Public Integrity and NBC News.

Corporations reaped the benefits of a tax rate slashed from 35% to 21% in Trump’s tax law, and exploited various deductions, tax credits and rebates.

“Instead of paying $16.4 billion in taxes, as the new 21 percent corporate tax rate requires, these companies enjoyed a net corporate tax rebate of $4.3 billion, blowing a $20.7 billion hole in the federal budget last year,” the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy report says.

Farm equipment manufacturer John Deere, for example, reported earning $2.15 billion in U.S. income before taxes. It owed no U.S. taxes in 2018 and reported the government owes the company $268 million because of various deductions and credits, the report says.

The cut in the corporate tax rate alone will save corporations $1.35 trillion over the next 10 years, according to the Joint Committee on Taxation.

As for the nation, revenues from the corporate tax fell by 31% in 2018 to $204 billion.

“This was a more precipitous decline than in any year of normal economic growth in U.S. history,” Matthew Gardner, Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy senior fellow, wrote in the report.

Trump insisted before his law was passed that the corporate tax cut would pay for itself. He argued that the giveback would trigger a boom in business operations that would lead to increased taxes on ballooning income, which would plug the giant hole in the budget.

But it hasn’t worked out that way. The nation’s budget deficit is now the biggest in history.

During his campaign, Trump vowed to eliminate the $19.9 trillion national debt in eight years. Instead, it jumped 41.8 percent in just the first four months of this fiscal year (which runs from October through September).

An April Government Accountability Office report called the “federal government’s current fiscal path ... unsustainable.” The cost of interest alone on the national debt runs $896 million each day.

Trump’s top economic adviser Larry Kudlow insisted Thursday that “economic growth” has already “paid for a good chunk” of the tax cuts. The budget outlook is “not as bad as many people say,” he said.

Bloomberg pointed out that Kudlow’s declaration defies data from his own administration.

Of course, what the article does not say is that many companies used counties with lower taxes to hide their profits through transfer pricing and other gimmicks throughout the years. Trump's plan lowered corporate taxes to keep more of the money in the united states, but this resulted in companies having to owe less, and thus, use loopholes and deductions established long ago under previous administrations to hit levels where they no longer owed tax.

You can argue whether tax policy is good, bad or indifferent, but it has nothing to do with the Federal Reserve's impact on the economy.

 

[UsualName]

Oh, come on. The tax bill drove the valuation of the market? Give me a freakin' break. What rubbish. I'm not saying the market didn't move up because of the tax bill, but this:

IS NOT because of the tax bill. Holy Christ, man.



? I can't tell if you're arguing with me or agreeing. Can you please focus a bit more and clarify your position?



How about the actual balance of the actual balance sheet?

By the way, the chart has to be logarithmic because the amount has grown so massively that a non-logarithmic graph would look like a meteoric line if it weren't.



Trump is clearly causing more of the same problem, but to suggest he should fix everything in the macro economy in two years is utterly ridiculous - like most of your posts in this thread. As for whether I have business experience, please. I am the Chief Financial Officer for a company with revenues just under $1B.



Yeah, yeah. Orange man bad and all that. I get it.



It would surprise me unless you told me this was how you were describing the economy on another planet. None of this happened in the last two years. It just got worse. Asset prices are more overvalued. Everything happened long before Trump got here. Your partisanship has blinded you - as always.



Presidents regularly meet with the Federal Reserve Chief. If you think they don't put pressure on them during this meeting...well, I was going to say you're clueless, but I think we've established that already.

The tax bill is certainly driving the market.

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/02/25/business/stock-market-buybacks.html

Combating deflation and a depression is what the Fed supposed to do. Arguing look at the expansion of the balance sheet since 2007 doesn’t make much sense because the balance sheet is supposed to expand in that scenario.

We were in a period of deflation and economic contraction, unemployment was sky rocketing. What should the fed do when they have dual mandate to control inflation and promote full employment in that scenario?

Is your problem with the fed’s mandate?

Also, the fed balance sheet is not at a record, currently. They began offloading it 2 years ago. They need to continue to offload it.

As a CFO, you’re trying to tell me you truly believe interest rates should be determined by an algorithm? This is not jibing. Maybe it will benefit you but in the real world the fed needs to be flexible not rigid. And who gets to determine the algorithm, you, Herman Cain?

My interpretation of what you are saying is that you have major issues with the Fed’s policy in reaction to the Great Recession. Perhaps you think a depression is what the country needed. But if you think a depression is what was needed then you have no right complain about Fed Governors being academics because I assure you a depression has very real world consequences and only an academic would say a depression is just what the country needed.

 

[piezoe]

Trump is clearly causing more of the same problem, but to suggest he should fix everything in the macro economy in two years is utterly ridiculous

Of course its ridiculous. Just as ridiculous as if the gold fish in my pond was expected to fix anything. My gold fish has exactly the same amount of knowledge about the U.S. economy as Trump does. Trump is totally dependent on others , the professionals in important government agencies, to block or ameliorate the effects of his incredibly stupid actions. The huge problem for the rest of us is that he has fired or driven away competent people and replaced them with less competent criminals like himself. His main criterion being loyalty, i.e., loyalty to the family. He's enriching himself not so much at our financial expense -- his stealing is a drop in the bucket compared to the federal budget -- but at the expense of decency and ethical behavior standards. He's a total disaster for the country in that sense. And the fianacial harm he is doing to some is not zero. Much of the real harm won't show up until he's gone. It may be that a future administration will be able to undo some of the damage he's done. Let's hope so.

In the meantime don't be concerned that the Fed Balance sheet in 2019 is greater than it was in 1919.

 

[CaptainObvious]

60 Top Corporations Paid $0 Federal Taxes Under Trump Tax Law
Amazon, Chevron, Netflix, Eli Lilly, IBM and General Motors are reaping tax cut benefits and paying nothing.


President Donald Trump’s new tax law aided corporations so radically that twice as many companies paid no federal taxes whatsoever in 2018, despite billions of dollars in profit, according to a new study.

Amazon, Netflix, Chevron, Eli Lilly, Delta Airlines, General Motors, IBM and Goodyear were among the tax-free corporate titans, according to an analysis by the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy, a Washington think tank, released Thursday.

The study found that 60 of some of the largest publicly held companies paid no taxes — compared with an average of about 30 each year from 2008 to 2015, before Trump and congressional Republicans passed the tax law that took effect in 2018. The measure heavily favors corporations and the wealthy.

The analysis is based on 2018 financial filings of the country’s largest 560 publicly held companies.

The companies that paid nothing in taxes were “able to zero out their federal income taxes on $79 billion in U.S. pretax income,” according to the study, first reported by the Center for Public Integrity and NBC News.

Corporations reaped the benefits of a tax rate slashed from 35% to 21% in Trump’s tax law, and exploited various deductions, tax credits and rebates.

“Instead of paying $16.4 billion in taxes, as the new 21 percent corporate tax rate requires, these companies enjoyed a net corporate tax rebate of $4.3 billion, blowing a $20.7 billion hole in the federal budget last year,” the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy report says.

Farm equipment manufacturer John Deere, for example, reported earning $2.15 billion in U.S. income before taxes. It owed no U.S. taxes in 2018 and reported the government owes the company $268 million because of various deductions and credits, the report says.

The cut in the corporate tax rate alone will save corporations $1.35 trillion over the next 10 years, according to the Joint Committee on Taxation.

As for the nation, revenues from the corporate tax fell by 31% in 2018 to $204 billion.

“This was a more precipitous decline than in any year of normal economic growth in U.S. history,” Matthew Gardner, Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy senior fellow, wrote in the report.

Trump insisted before his law was passed that the corporate tax cut would pay for itself. He argued that the giveback would trigger a boom in business operations that would lead to increased taxes on ballooning income, which would plug the giant hole in the budget.

But it hasn’t worked out that way. The nation’s budget deficit is now the biggest in history.

During his campaign, Trump vowed to eliminate the $19.9 trillion national debt in eight years. Instead, it jumped 41.8 percent in just the first four months of this fiscal year (which runs from October through September).

An April Government Accountability Office report called the “federal government’s current fiscal path ... unsustainable.” The cost of interest alone on the national debt runs $896 million each day.

Trump’s top economic adviser Larry Kudlow insisted Thursday that “economic growth” has already “paid for a good chunk” of the tax cuts. The budget outlook is “not as bad as many people say,” he said.

Bloomberg pointed out that Kudlow’s declaration defies data from his own administration.

And this is new? Corporations don't pay taxes, any taxes. Never have, never will. Taxes are built into what they charge for goods and services. Raise the taxes, they will raise their prices.

 

[Cuddles]

And this is new? Corporations don't pay taxes, any taxes. Never have, never will. Taxes are built into what they charge for goods and services. Raise the taxes, they will raise their prices.

Yeah, but this year, the number has doubled from last.

 

[CaptainObvious]

Yeah, but this year, the number has doubled from last.

No, the number has not doubled. The number corporations paying taxes was, is, and always will be zero. Taxes are overhead, and all overhead cost is passed on to the customer. Consumers of their goods and services, you and me, we pay the taxes.

 

[Cuddles]

No, the number has not doubled. The number corporations paying taxes was, is, and always will be zero. Taxes are overhead, and all overhead cost is passed on to the customer. Consumers of their goods and services, you and me, we pay the taxes.

https://www.nbcnews.com/business/ta...aying-zero-taxes-under-trump-tax-plan-n993046


Twice as many companies paying zero taxes under Trump tax plan
The Tax Cuts and Jobs Act lowered the corporate tax rate from 35 percent to 21 percent. In its first year, the number of companies paying no taxes went from 30 to 60.

https://itep.org/wp-content/uploads...ce-Remains-Rampant-Under-New-Tax-Law_ITEP.pdf

 

[CaptainObvious]

https://www.nbcnews.com/business/ta...aying-zero-taxes-under-trump-tax-plan-n993046


Twice as many companies paying zero taxes under Trump tax plan
The Tax Cuts and Jobs Act lowered the corporate tax rate from 35 percent to 21 percent. In its first year, the number of companies paying no taxes went from 30 to 60.

https://itep.org/wp-content/uploads...ce-Remains-Rampant-Under-New-Tax-Law_ITEP.pdf

I don't care what the article states. Corporations or any other business do not pay taxes, ever. If a company pays a tax bill, that is funded by the money they made from charging their customers for whatever goods or services they provided. If a company pays no tax bill it just means they have better tax attorneys and profits will be better as a result, same as if they reduced their labor force, or rent, or healthcare benefits, or the friggin light bill. All of these costs of doing business are built into the price they charge. Subtract all these costs of business which are all built into the overhead, including taxes, and the rest is profit. You could 100% eliminate all tax loopholes and then every company would pay a tax bill to the government. ONE HINDRED PERCENT of that money would come from whatever they charged their customers. They would be forced to raise their prices to offset that additional cost, or suffer lower profits. In the end consumers pay, nobody else.