Friday, August 17, 2012
ExxonMobil Paid $1 Trillion in Taxes Since 1999, Three Times Its Profits
Comments
The government has so many hidden taxes that get passed on through higher prices, people have no idea how much they are really paying to fund the bloated bureacracies -- in this case, over $1 trillion. Of course, that's the idea. I would love for government taxes and fees to be shown as separate line items on price stickers, starting with gasoline.
Posted by: Woody | Aug 17, 2012 10:25:43 AM
"Counting excises as taxes paid by ExxonMobil makes as much sense as counting the sales tax collected on big screen televisions by Best Buy as being tax paid by Best Buy."
Except that the sales tax is imposed on the buyer; the seller is simply required to collect it. The excises paid by ExxonMobil were its own obligations, and nothing required it to pass it through to its customers.
Posted by: guy helvering | Aug 17, 2012 8:40:54 AM
jmike,
Companies never bear the economic burden of taxes. That is the point that Mitt Romney was making, however inelegantly, when he said, "Corporations are people." What he meant is that ALL tax burdens on corporations eventually are passed onto individuals in the form of higher prices for goods, lower wages for labor, and lower returns to capital. The precise distribution of this burden is up for debate, but it's axiomatic that all taxes (excise, income, or otherwise) are eventually passed along to individuals in one form or another.
Posted by: JM | Aug 17, 2012 6:47:30 AM
What intellectual sewage!! Do you really accept the idea that ExxonMobil did not shift the excise tax burden to its customers? The company did not bear these taxes. It served as a conduit for moving the tax between the customers for its products and the government. Counting excises as taxes paid by ExxonMobil makes as much sense as counting the sales tax collected on big screen televisions by Best Buy as being tax paid by Best Buy.
Posted by: jmike | Aug 17, 2012 5:21:20 AM
The headline in the linked pieces and the excerpted chart is deceitful (or ignorant). The problem is the word "paid.". The income tax figure, for example is in fact XOM's provision for income taxes, pulled straight from the consolidated income statement. This number bears as much relationship to income taxes paid as Cole Hamels's ERA does to Tom Brady's QB rating.
Posted by: Jeff Silver | Aug 17, 2012 3:54:54 AM
Guy, you are factually mistaken. Some states impose the sales tax liability on the seller but permit the seller to collect the tax from buyers.
Posted by: Minor quibble | Aug 17, 2012 9:01:32 PM