Amazing << Hear this. Feel this, and tell me that this isn't music.
Groove to Black Violin EPK, too.
Posted on 12/14/2008 5:17:56 PM PST by SeekAndFind
Think that class warfare and mindless anti-business hatred don’t have real-life consequences?
Think again:
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Much political hay has been made in Congress about “unpatriotic” corporations that move operations abroad. Weatherford International is the latest, taking its headquarters from Houston to Switzerland. The oil services company said that it wants to be closer to its markets. But what it really meant was that it no longer saw the future in the U.S.
In a political atmosphere of blaming corporations, it’s no wonder. Halliburton fled to Dubai in 2007. Tyco International, Foster Wheeler and Transocean International all went to Switzerland. As a pattern emerges, America’s global standing diminishes, in part because it’s based on the willingness of companies to invest. It’s an especially bad sign when domestic companies flee.
“The U.S. is an important market,” Weatherford CEO Bernard J. Duroc-Danner told the Houston Chronicle Thursday. But, “it’s just a market. It’s not the primary market.”
How does that sound for a loss of global leadership? If that’s not clear enough, try this: “In the hierarchical pecking order, (Houston’s) not going to be Rome anymore.”
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This is what happens when oil companies are unremittingly portrayed as villains, when various businesses have their patriotism questioned as a consequence of rational and entirely defensible decisions that they make–decisions that are based on the current climate in the United States and when politicians threaten to remove all restraints on the power of unions through antidemocratic measures like card check. It’s imperative, of course, to reverse this trend of business flight–especially given the current economic downturn and the need to rebound from it–and yet, the same old class warfare and Pavlovian demonization of business continues unabated.
Business is not blameless, to be sure. Large enterprises staffed by human beings make mistakes. But there is a difference between honest criticism and demagoguery. The former makes the target of criticism better. The latter only serves to drive away any prospect whatsoever of reasoned discourse. And in the present case, it is serving to drive away moneymaking, job-creating, service-providing enterprises, which have decided that they can do better outside the United States than they can in it.
If you think this won’t have deleterious consequences for the American economy, then you will probably also believe that Rod Blagojevich is both intellectually brilliant and morally incorruptible.
Hey, if you raise taxes, increase vulnerability to lawsuits, raise union demands on employers, unionize every small business in the U.S. and increase government regulations by the volume, the businesses will leave the U.S.
THAT results in virtually NO ILLEGAL ALIENS. They have no reason to come to the US if the businesses leave!
Any you thought Obama was stupid! He will solve the border problem.
/heavy sarcasm
Maybe in the future utopia, when all of the wealth-creating corporations leave, we can gain income by cutting one another’s hair.
I’m waiting for IBM, Xerox, and Kodak to completely pull out of the U.S. They threatened to do so years ago. If they do pull out, Rochester, N.Y. will become a ghost town.
The fact of high Union demands, and the second highest corporate tax rate in the world, couldn’t possibly have anything to do with it. Could it?
Amazing << Hear this. Feel this, and tell me that this isn't music.
Groove to Black Violin EPK, too.
bump
Lollipop and Dodd could care less.
you vilify and berate 5% of the populace, then complain that they don’t sit idle while you fleece them and their hard work? get real.
this is not the country i grew up in. this is not Regan’s America where hard work and merit were rewarded. welcome to the first POTUS fruit from the affirmative action tree.
0bama and his cronies can bite me. go get your taxes from the other 95%.
Right on Sten. I am spending from now until April 15th looking for EVERY way possible to pay the minimum taxes possible for this year. From now on....
yes, we do.
a corporation could easily base in any number of countries and only receive 10-18% tax (0% in some countries). compare that to 50-65% tax levied on profits from an S-corp in the US... and that is before they expire the Bush tax cuts, increasing the taxes by 5%
and i have also heard the rabid libs saying they want to expire the Regan tax cuts. (!!!)
we are far passed the point where people reach for the tea... only patriotism allowed many of us to get this far. but when it goes from 50% to over 70%, you’ve lost it.
hmmm... earl grey should be good for such an occasion
The federal government has forced American manufacturers to compete in the global marketplace with one arm tied behind their backs. When they fail, the hypocrites in Washington shout that they need a management change because, in their greed, they price their stuff out of the market.
We are told that there are only two options: Bail them out or say goodbye to ANOTHER industry in the same way we waved goodbye to televisions, steel, shoes, clothing, electronics, etc., etc.
The MAJOR factor is our INSANE FEDERAL INCOME TAX POLICY, which effectively subsidizes the importation and purchase of foreign made products! By meddling in and perverting economic laws of which they have NO understanding, our own incompetent government has caused the mess we are in.
All of it!
By taxing U.S. corporations, the federal income tax imposes around a thirty percent artificial inflation of the cost of American made products before ANY other factors - such as costs of production, raw materials, labor, etc. - are considered. And since businesses - yes, Virginia, even “greedy”
corporations - DO NOT PAY taxes, they COLLECT them and - unless they wish to
become candidates for bankruptcy – MUST PASS THEM ON IN THE PRICES OF THEIR GOODS AND SERVICES. (Oh, wait, the auto manufacturers are already at the courthouse door!)
The Marxist income tax is as bad an idea now as it was when the Founders denied Congress the power to tax us in that way at two separate places in the original Constitution. Replacing it with a national retail sales tax (like the Fair Tax or a slight variation of it) would purge that burden from the cost of production of
American made products so they could compete with the foreign made products now enjoying an unfair competitive advantage . Americans would start buying American products again, and we would start selling more of our products overseas.
Because the governments of our competitors are apparently much smarter than the folks in Washington, to protect THEIR manufacturers, all of our foreign competitors levy a consumption tax on OUR cars when they come across their borders. They are permitted to REMOVE their Value Added Taxes on their exports to us.
And when American exporters send OUR goods abroad, they not only face the levies imposed by the foreign government, but thanks to our foolishly agreeing to the provision in GATT prohibiting the removal of embedded income taxes in goods WE export, is it any wonder why our stuff can’t compete?
Do you think a change in tax policy would start to bring all manner of lost industry back home to the USA? Can you say “DUUUHHH?”
Instead of using our heads, we rag on those “greedy” corporations.
By not demanding rational changes in the way we tax ourselves, I guess we deserve to lose the auto industry the way we have lost the clothing, shoes, electronics (remember American made televisions?), steel and other US production.
Stupid is as stupid does and “insanity” is defined as doing the same thing over and over while expecting a different result.
Isn’t it long past time America stopped being stupid and actually DO something DIFFERENT?
If you’d like to share your thoughts with the folks in Washington, the U.S. Senate and House sites are listed below.
Better hurry as we’ve heard that the entire internet is being packed up to be shipped overseas to a more competitive nation.
U.S. Senate: http://www.senate.gov/
U.S. House: http://www.house.gov/
Maybe if they ALL paid taxes and didn't use corporate loopholes, the rate wouldn't be so high.
You blame them? As hostile as the U.S. market is to basic industries, I’m surprised they haven’t left already.
hey, i'm in favor of that! let's get the 48% of the populace that is not paying taxes and make them pay taxes.
but then again, we have another issue before you accept a RAISE in taxes....
people should DEMAND a FULL accounting of EVERY tax penny being brought in from EVERY source. let's find out just exactly how much is already being brought in.
once we have that, just like any good business, you need to identify ALL your expenses... down to the PENNY
only AFTER this has been accomplished in a manner as it would be available every quarter moving forward, would increasing of taxes brought in be allowed.
this would be known as a sound business practice... something the people in washdc know very little about.
>>I’m a little slow, who is Lollipop ?
I’m guessing Barney Frank.
The Atlas Shrugged theory of American businesses relocating abroad sounds at least somewhat correct to me, but this piece does not prove it. Corporations leave the U.S. for many reasons other than their pariah status with Democrats and the MSM. There are some great business opportunities abroad.
Let's see some numbers from the exiting companies showing the relative costs of leaving and staying.
Rush’s theme music for Barney Frank is the song “My Boy Lollipop.”
bump
How about this?
Review that dusty, old document known as the U.S. Constitution for the number of actual powers delegated by it (or the people/states) to the federal government. Once that is done, eliminate approximately 80% (or more) of the federal government’s size because the vast majority of what the government meddles in is not provided for in the Constitution. This is followed by the adoption of “lean” strategies in what’s left. There can be no nibbling around the edges of the government; it must be drastically hacked at once.
7% flat tax - No deductions. Everyone keeps much more of their property and the government is much smaller.
I know but I can dream.
1rudeboy wrote: “Maybe if they ALL paid taxes and didn’t use corporate loopholes, the rate wouldn’t be so high.”
..... Take a look at federal, state, and local government budgets versus the nation’s GDP. We do not have a revenue problem; we have a government spending problem.
Leave or be taxed, regulated, and nationalized. The outcome’s pretty clear.
I thought it was “Banking Queen”.....ala ABBA.
bump
The point is to cut spending by government to the bare minimums. Defense, foreign relations (State) and maybe some health/CDC operations. Let the states do the rest, or local government. Pay for it by a flat tax of 2-5%. That's it. Ban unions from any government employees at every level. And make those elected leeches leave after a set time and get real jobs. With NO retirement benefits.
(Good for you! IMHO, you should change your name from 'Unocal' to 'Nocal'! ;>)
Numerous other companies (not to mention tens of thousands of individuals) have followed suit. The State government nevertheless continued to spend money like a drunken, Hollywood pedophile director. The Calbanians have made their bed - let them suffer in it, permanently - WITHOUT ANY federal assistance (i.e., assistance from the other States)...
Welcome to New Kenya (Africa U.S.A.)
“Where the law of the jungle has replaced the Law of the Land”
Except for Japan...
It used to be "My Boy Lollipop," but that may have changed.
I don't listen to Rush nearly as much as I once did. His show is on at the wrong time for me.
Heard the banking queen set off last week. It’s not as good as lollipop, tho.
The idea of moving abroad is not in Atlas Shrugged. In the Ayn Rand book, businesses shut down completely. Usually in an orderly and legal fashion they simply stopped doing business. The owners then disappeared. They stopped producing for "the people", they removed their sanction. In the book the other countries around the world were no better (and in most cases worse) than the US. The US was seen as the last best hope for freedom and free markets.
I've listened to the book multiple times, and with each passing day I see that life is imitating art. The book presents the situation in the extreme, as it must for a novel, but the parallels are uncanny.
I've taken my cue from her works and decided to Shrug awhile ago, my "shutdown" will be complete on Dec 31st.
Congratulations. I wish I could do the same.
Yep. That's our boy Lollipop
“I’m waiting for IBM, Xerox, and Kodak to completely pull out of the U.S.”
Regarding IBM you won’t have long to wait...there’s a massive US layoff planned for Jan-Feb/09 that will probably take the number of US-based IBMers down to around 30% of the worldwide total.
IBM has been racing to the low cost employee countries for the last several years. Press 1 for English. Press 2 for Jibberish.
You are one business hating guy.
Sound a little liberal to me.
I am basing this on numerous post of yours.
Hopefully you don’t ever run a business here.
You nailed it, Sir.
Our ‘leaders’ have sold a bill of goods to the American people and a majority of the floks bought into it.
Why we keep hammering on our profitable companies is beyond me...
We bash success and reward slovenliness.
We sue our companies, regulate them, grill the executives, shame them and then wonder why they choose to leave.
I personally favor a National Sales tax. What %, I dont know, but that way, over 80% of the tax is collected by large stores and companies minimizing cheating. It also eliminates the insane network of deductions, loopholes, investments for shelter, it captures the tax from the underground economy...
But politicians would be giving up their power. The power to tax is the power to destroy and they love that power.
The consent of the governed is being sorely tested by the fools in Washington. They are already pushing out those who can move overseas (corporations) and will finally cause Atlas to not only shrug.
WAKE UP AMERICA
All is not lost! Look at all the motel managers and convenience store owners we have gained.
If they find 'loopholes' someone had to create the law to allow them. If I can find a LEGAL way to keep from paying MORE taxes you can't bet I'm going to use it!
I don't blame corporations for moving somewhere they don't have bureaucrats and unions trying to run THEIR business. I am only willing to pay employees what WE (employee & I)agree they are worth not some union thug or congress person!
You a Liberal?
Mmmmmm, the last I checked there is no oil drilling in Switzerland. For that matter, none to speak of in Europe.
We are going to be seeing a lot of international oil related companies leaving here. Frankly, I am surprised Exxon has not left yet. The whole liberal political wing will blow a gasket when they do and I bet a complete internal study has been conducted about where, when and how much $ will be saved.
CEOs have a responsibility to see that their company uses every loophole they can to lower their taxes as much as possible. They owe that to their share holders. A CEO who does not do that should be fired. Your elected officials make the loopholes.
Definitely not a liberal - just a very disgruntled conservative. :)
Of course, they’re going to take the legal loopholes. My point was that most corporations don’t come close to paying the actual corporate rate.
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