COMPANY SEEKS TO AVOID ONEROUS CORPORATE TAX …
This website has no love for Big Pharma (a.k.a. large corporate pharmaceutical firms). We think excessive pill-popping – and the government subsidization thereof – is one of the main reasons this country is going under.
Seriously … we never deal with stuff anymore in this country, we just take a friggin’ pill.
Anyway, drug manufacturer Pfizer has made billions off of our country’s unhealthy pharmaceutical dependency – much of it coming from government. In fact the company’s latest annual report makes its own “dependence” on taxpayer subsidies abundantly clear …
“Any significant spending reductions affecting Medicare, Medicaid or other publicly funded or subsidized health programs … could have an adverse impact on our results of operations,” the report stated.
How’s that for a “Pfree” market, people …
Now the New York-based giant – which produces medications like Viagra and Lipitor – is trying to buy British drugmaker AstraZeneca for more than $100 billion. Except this attempted acquisition isn’t just about market share – it’s about taxes. Specifically, Pfizer is hoping to avoid excessively high American corporate taxes by “reincorporating” in England – a process known as “inversion.”
Such a move would save its shareholders billions of dollars.
As part of Pfizer’s efforts to convince British leaders to approve the sale, the company is promising to maintain a certain level of jobs in Great Britain (where it currently employs nearly 7,000 people). Obviously that means fewer jobs in America – in addition to that disappearing tax base.
American lawmakers are furious – and have proposed retroactive punishments for Pfizer in the event the company decides to hop the pond.
“Corporations must understand that they won’t profit from abandoning the U.S.,” liberal Oregon Sen. Ron Wyden said.
Wow …
Think about that statement for a moment … here we have a U.S. Senator threatening to retroactively punish a company for attempting to escape America’s onerous tax system.
“As much as I dislike the industry, preventing Pfizer from leaving is a form of financial slavery,” writes Simon Black of The Sovereign Man. “At a minimum, it’s a form of financial repression and capital controls.”
Indeed …
This website supports corporate tax relief. We don’t think it is quite as essential to job growth and expanded consumerism as individual income tax relief (i.e. cutting the tax that’s paid by the vast majority of businesses in America) – but the fact remains the United States currently has the highest corporate tax rate in the industrialized world, averaging 39.1 percent.
Don’t believe us? Take a look at this chart …
(Click to enlarge)
(Chart via Tax Foundation)
Again, we wouldn’t place corporate tax relief ahead of individual income tax relief on a list of job-creating, economy-expanding priorities, but it is on the list … even for a company like Pfizer.
More to the point, threatening a company – any company – with retroactive consequences for deciding to flee a repressive tax system is the latest mile marker in America’s ongoing descent into Orwellian hell.
Because if they can do it to a company like Pfizer, they can do it to you …
19 comments
Against Big Pharma but let’s legalize Dope.
Let’s make big Pharma richer – let them handle pharmaceutical grade dope, and legalize dope at the same time.
Who can blame Pfizer…heck, even Google thought of floating barges to house servers to avoid taxes…
As always happens, somebody or something has to pay to supply the revenue for government services. Below are the individual UK rates.
Rate
Dividend income
Savings income
Other income (inc employment)
Band (above any personal allowance)
Basic rate
10%
20%
20%
£0 – £31,865
Higher rate
32.5%
40%
40%
£31,866- £150,000
Additional rate
37.5%
42.5%
45%
Over £150,000
Sorry for how the chart posted. Come back please Nancy Mace.
“Government services”
LMAO!
so how do you define police, the military, etc?
Thugs on the receiving end of protection money.
Obviously you must be a member of Westboro Baptist if that is your attitude toward the military.
And lets not forget Kelo v New London Conn. where the US Supreme Court ostensibly gave private land to private companies for economic development- a public purpose- even though that phrase is no where in the Constitution. The 5th amendment requires a public use for a government to take private lands. The Supreme Court wiped its behind with the Constitution on that one. Stevens wrote the opinion. Pfizer was the recipient of a majority of that land. Now Pfizer has left New London entirely and the property is mostly vacant if not entirely vacant. People were removed from property that had been in their family for generations. I say good riddance.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/13/nyregion/13pfizer.html?_r=0
Once the deductions and exemptions and tax credits are figured in, the US rate drops down to the average level. The chart does not represent that, but then that wouldn’t support their narrative. Lies, damn lies, statistics.
You got that right, figures don’t lie but liars figure and they all do it.
And all those deductions, exemptions and tax credits create endless opportunities for cronyism and graft. It allows politicians to use tax money to reward favorites in the “free” market. It would be better to eliminate the deductions, etc. and just tax at a lower rate.
Excuse me sir, you can’t bring facts into a fact-free zone!
I don’t know about the country is going down the drain by taking pills but they are definitely are getting high on pills and enjoying it. Much like people who drink.
Fits ——“Seriously … we never deal with stuff anymore in this country, we just take a friggin’ pill.”
Will prefers herbs.
Now all they need to do is outsource all their jobs to Asia and they’ll be living the actual American Dream: milking the American people for all you can and giving them as few jobs or tax revenue for it as you can in return. The essence of patriotism.
God Bless America.
“The more that the tax burden is shifted off of corporations like Pfizer, the more it is shifted onto us, and it will be done so indirectly through higher deficits”
Hold on a second, skippy. Who do you think pays that “tax burden” now? Hint: if you use Viagra, Lipitor, or about a 1000 other drugs they make…you do.
How do you count this as “fleeing” the free market?