Goldman Sachs Says "**** You America!"

[KrazyHorse]

What the hell is a "gs package"?

Remember that I am not an accredited investor per us rules (I was a graduate student until a year ago

[dannubis]

E.g. the investment they propose in Facebook.

[KrazyHorse]

I was not made the offer, and could not have been legally

[dannubis]

OK, thanks. That is what I thought.

[N35t0r]

What do you mean "can they do this legally"? Subsidiaries don't have to repatriate profits to the parent entity if they don't want to, AFAIK.

Ah, right. Wasn't thinking about subsidiaries.

[Dinner]

In all honesty, a lot of that stuff sounds like accounting hijinks to me (I have no experience with this aspect of anybody's business practices, but looking from the outside in). It's hard for me to get worked up about, however, as the economically reasonable rte of corporate taxation is 0.

I couldn't disagree with you more. Corporations try to play both sides of the "corporations are people" argument; in the Citizens United case they got all the campaign finance laws thrown out because they claimed Corporations are legally people so they supposedly have a constitutionally protected right to free speech but on the other hand they claim since they're not people they shouldn't have to pay taxes on income. They can't have it both ways. Either they aren't people, and so we have a right to regulate or even stop their bribery, or they are people, in which case they need to pay taxes just like any other person but they can't keep switching their argument when ever it suits them.

[Dauphin]

I don't see much problem with making corporations tax transparent. It gives headaches to tax planning and makes entering contracts impossible if they aren't legal persons.

[notyoueither]

What do you mean by 'making corporations tax transparent?'

[Kuciwalker]

but on the other hand they claim since they're not people they shouldn't have to pay taxes on income

No. The objection to the corporate income tax is that it amounts to an extremely high marginal tax rate on deferred consumption. Also, it severely distorts the capital structure of firms.

[giblets]

I couldn't disagree with you more. Corporations try to play both sides of the "corporations are people" argument; in the Citizens United case they got all the campaign finance laws thrown out because they claimed Corporations are legally people so they supposedly have a constitutionally protected right to free speech but on the other hand they claim since they're not people they shouldn't have to pay taxes on income. They can't have it both ways. Either they aren't people, and so we have a right to regulate or even stop their bribery, or they are people, in which case they need to pay taxes just like any other person but they can't keep switching their argument when ever it suits them.

Also, why don't corporations have to register for the draft?

[Dauphin]

What do you mean by 'making corporations tax transparent?'

Tax transparency is treating the profits earnt by an entity as income earned by the members of that entity - i.e. it's as if the entity is not there for calculating tax. In the way that a partnership pays no tax, because any profits are divided between the partners and accounted for in their personal tax affairs - regardless of whether distributions are made to said partners.

[notyoueither]

OK. Thanks.