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Hanson: Silicon Valley Billionaires Are the New Robber Barons
San Jose Mercury News ^

Posted on 08/17/2017 10:08:50 PM PDT by nickcarraway

Progressives used to pressure U.S. corporations to cut back on outsourcing and on the tactic of building their products abroad to take advantage of inexpensive foreign workers.

During the 2012 election, President Obama attacked Mitt Romney as a potential illiberal “outsourcer in chief” for investing in companies that went overseas in search of cheap labor. Yet most of the computers and smartphones sold by Silicon Valley companies are still being built abroad — to mostly silence from progressive watchdogs.

In the case of the cobalt mining that is necessary for the production of lithium-ion batteries in electric cars, thousands of child laborers in Southern Africa are worked to exhaustion.

Few seem to care that West Coast conglomerates such as Amazon, Apple, Google and Starbucks filtered hundreds of billions in global profits through tax havens such as Bermuda, shorting the United States billions of dollars in income taxes.

The progressive movement took hold in the late 19th century to “trust-bust,” or break up corporations that had cornered the markets in banking, oil, steel and railroads. Such supposedly foul play had inordinately enriched “robber baron” buccaneers such as John D. Rockefeller, Andrew Mellon, Andrew Carnegie and J.P. Morgan.

(Excerpt) Read more at mercurynews.com ...


TOPICS: Business/Economy; Constitution/Conservatism; Extended News; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: amazon; apple; bermuda; google; lobbying; oxfam; panamapapers; starbucks; taxhavens
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1 posted on 08/17/2017 10:08:50 PM PDT by nickcarraway
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To: nickcarraway

Indeed.

And these guys are more inherently evil than the old ones.


2 posted on 08/17/2017 10:20:26 PM PDT by LegendHasIt
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To: nickcarraway

Surprised the Mercury News printed this.


3 posted on 08/17/2017 10:21:13 PM PDT by Behind the Blue Wall
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To: nickcarraway

There are ways for conservatives to avoid using these technologies. Start by downloading the Brave browser- it blocks all ads and prevents surveillance and data mining by Google. It was started by Brendan Eich, the former CEO of Mozilla who got fired for fighting the gay agenda.
https://brave.com/download/

Then, start using other search engines. I’ve started using Qwant.com, but others exist like duckduckgo. These don’t keep a record of your search history, so it can’t be used against you if Google decides that Christianity and low taxes are now tenets of Nazism.

Social media is harder, but I’ve opened up a Protonmail account to start making more subscriptions with. Protonmail is based in Switzerland and fully encrypted, meaning it too is not tracked. You can use Telegram or WhatsApp, which are both encrypted, to avoid Facebook or Google monitoring your chat histories. Take the case of the Harvard teens who were denied admission for their meme chats as a sign of what could come for Christian conservatives.


4 posted on 08/17/2017 10:34:30 PM PDT by BostonNeocon
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To: nickcarraway

the merc news printed VDH? i’m in shock.

although i’ve known this for years (having worked in sv for years), it’s nice to see VDH bringing it to the fore.


5 posted on 08/17/2017 10:36:39 PM PDT by dadfly
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To: nickcarraway
Oh, my, now isn't this interesting? VDH appears to break a little new ground in this one and it's a good thing he has tenure because the Silicon Valley Mafia will be coming for him.

A brief demurral - Carnegie was never a robber baron in this sense. The rest, oh my yes. Rockefeller, Morgan, oh, yes.

The key to this dubious title is the employment of insane wealth to effect power outside the field of mere capitalistic competition. And such creatures as Mark "A Wall For Me, None For Thee" Zuckerberg are symptomatic of a very dark drive for power that money can buy. So many of these men and women begin with the object of empowering the individual and end up determined to control that individual that one has to wonder if there isn't some nasty compulsion at work here. Lord Acton was right: absolute power corrupts absolutely.

It was, in the end, "progressives" (in the original meaning) such as Teddy "The Trust-Buster" Roosevelt that dealt with this form of abuse. What is different today is that our academic and industry progressives are largely as much a part of the Uniparty as the political end of things. All one big, happy, self-funding, self-perpetuating family. This explains why Trump, who is quite outside this cozy mutual arrangement, is such a mortal threat. He can't be bought. And that's a problem.

But in the Obama era, the nation received all sorts of progressive lectures on the downsides of being super-rich. Yet such sermonizing never seemed to include Facebook, Starbucks or Amazon.

Naturally not. Today's proggies have been bought and paid for - that's what is different about this. And the currency isn't money, it's power, employed with a criminal and murderous ruthlessness that makes the old robber barons look like altar boys. If such a creature as 0bama could become comfortable with directing killing - about which he boasted - what are we to expect from the likes of Zuckerberg, Cook, and the rest of this bunch?

Kudos to VDH for broaching it. I hope he has somebody watching his back.

6 posted on 08/17/2017 10:47:14 PM PDT by Billthedrill
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To: nickcarraway
Few seem to care that West Coast conglomerates such as Amazon, Apple, Google and Starbucks filtered hundreds of billions in global profits through tax havens such as Bermuda, shorting the United States billions of dollars in income taxes.

Poorly researched and false to fact article. Apple, for example, has zero presence in Bermuda or other "tax havens," and in fact pays its income taxes in the United States, with an average ~27.5% effective tax rate on its world wide profits. In some years, Apple has been the single largest payer of US Income Taxes. . . In 2012, for example, Apple paid $1 out of every $40 of business income taxes paid that year!

Why post an article from an anti capitalist viewpoint on Freerepublic, especially one that distorts facts?

7 posted on 08/17/2017 10:48:01 PM PDT by Swordmaker (This tag line is a Microsoft insult free zone... but if the insults to Mac users continue...)
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To: nickcarraway
Usually Hanson gets his facts straight, and I as an economist applaud him for it. . . This time he shot from the hip, accepting the talking points of the know nothing liberal critics. Some of the tech firms do indeed use the off-shore tax-haven approach, but in 2014, Apple, accused by Senate committee staff investigators of paying zero US income taxes and moving Apple profits off shore to Ireland, went before a Senate Investigative Committe and under oath bared their accounting and audited corporate US TAX RETURNS, showing that Apple does not play games with US Income Taxes. Apple demonstrated the money held off-shore was money earned off-shore on which Apple had already paid both foreign AND, most importantly, US Income Taxes. ,p> The same can and could not be said for Microsoft, Google, Amazon, or Facebook, all of which used tax shelter schemes to lower their US effective tax rates to as low as 11%, or in the case of Amazon to less than 0.

I don't know what the individual officers of Apple have set up to shelter their earnings. That's private, but the above on Apple's accounting, audits, and taxes is all in public records.

8 posted on 08/17/2017 11:08:07 PM PDT by Swordmaker (This tag line is a Microsoft insult free zone... but if the insults to Mac users continue...)
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To: LegendHasIt; Billthedrill; Bon mots

[In the case of the cobalt mining that is necessary for the production of lithium-ion batteries in electric cars, thousands of child laborers in Southern Africa are worked to exhaustion. ]

It Takes a Village - To Build a Prius

I’m counting on Bon mots to create a fine meme from my words.

;)


9 posted on 08/17/2017 11:10:14 PM PDT by SaveFerris (Luke 17:28 ... as it was in the days of Lot; they did eat, they drank, they bought, they sold ....)
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To: nickcarraway

I’ve always admired Victor David Hanson. Thanks for posting.


10 posted on 08/17/2017 11:14:17 PM PDT by ransomnote
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To: Swordmaker

To be blunt, if these companies and their top executives are going to be engaging in liberal politics and attacking conservatives, then they don’t GET to hide behind the cloak of “capitalism” anymore. This is a zero-sum game; they should have the antitrust enforcers sicced on them and face political consequences for their actions.


11 posted on 08/17/2017 11:18:37 PM PDT by seacapn
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To: Swordmaker
Panama Papers Leak Update: Apple, Microsoft, Walmart Hiding Trillions In Tax Haven?
12 posted on 08/17/2017 11:21:42 PM PDT by Fedora
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To: LegendHasIt
Let's confiscate their wealth and give it to the people! Isn't that what they have been suggesting or were they talking about someone else’s money.
13 posted on 08/17/2017 11:55:31 PM PDT by Herakles (Diversity is a globalist scam for power!)
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To: nickcarraway

I wish he’d added Elon Musk and the billions in subsidies he received for Tesla cars. The new Edison, some call him?

Laughing all the way to the bank.


14 posted on 08/18/2017 12:08:41 AM PDT by llevrok (A group of baboons is called a "congress." Just sayin' .....)
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To: Fedora
Panama Papers Leak Update: Apple, Microsoft, Walmart Hiding Trillions In Tax Haven?

I'm rolling on the floor laughing my ass off on that "exposé' by a super liberal socialist anti capitalist unthinktank. Here's what their research claims Apple is "hiding":

Apple is currently on the top of Oxfam’s list. Oxfam believes Apple is holding $181 billion offshore in three subsidiaries.

The deep research in 2015 MISSED about $30 Billion. . . and Apple is hiding nothing. Apple reports it's off shore cash and short term holdings every quarter in the quarterly public financial conference call, and also in their publicly filed with the Federal Exchange Commission quarterly form 10-Q. I say that the Oxfam's ace researchers missed $30 Billion in Apple's "hidden" off-shore assets because had they just bothered to READ THE F'N 10-Q, they would have learned that Apple's off-shore accumulated assets the quarter before they released their hyperbolic report was over $212 Billion, all of which Apple had already paid its US and foreign Income Taxes on. . . and they'd have learned that Apple's effective tax rate on its gross profit was 28.3% that quarter. . . including the tax credits, set asides, etc, they claim far out weighed the actual taxes paid, which is a pile of steaming bovine excrement.

The Panama Papers it turns out indict very few American companies, but lots of foreign ones. Nice try. As I stated, Apple's audited books and publicly filed reports account for every dollar, and tell where those ALREADY TAXED dollars are.

Did you not bother to read the FACTS I posted above before you googled and linked to an article on a report from a known anticapitalist, socialist lying organization dedicated to overthrowing our economy? Apparently not. The so-called Panama .

15 posted on 08/18/2017 2:22:16 AM PDT by Swordmaker (This tag line is a Microsoft insult free zone... but if the insults to Mac users continue...)
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To: Fedora

By-the-way, at the last conference call, Apple’s chief financial office (CFO) proudly announced those holdings were now over $260 BILLION. He also stated that Apple would love to bring that money to the United States but the US is one of only two nations in the world that taxes money earned off shore both when it’s earned AND when it crosses our border. . . and that is taxed at a rate of 35%. The other country with such an idiotic tax law is a dictatorial, land-locked African nation with no multinational companies headquartered within its borders. At least, their tax rate is lower. That law alone is why the money isn’t here already.


16 posted on 08/18/2017 2:32:43 AM PDT by Swordmaker (This tag line is a Microsoft insult free zone... but if the insults to Mac users continue...)
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To: Swordmaker
What makes you think Silicon Valley and Apple are "capitalist"?

"Tim Cook will mark his five-year anniversary as the CEO of Apple by doing something that his predecessor Steve Jobs typically avoided: hosting a fundraiser for a presidential candidate. On Wednesday, Cook and Lisa Jackson, Apple's (AAPL, Tech30) head of environmental initiatives, will host an event in California to raise money for Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign. Those invited have reportedly been asked to contribute as much as $50,000.": Silicon Valley throws big money at Clinton and virtually nothing at Trump

Oxfam's allegations remain under investigation in court. If they've got the paperwork to back it up, laughing it off as "a super liberal socialist anti capitalist unthinktank" isn't going to cut it.

State aid ruling shows Apple is the tip of the iceberg in Ireland

EU lawmakers back tax clampdown on Google, Apple

17 posted on 08/18/2017 2:38:18 AM PDT by Fedora
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To: Fedora
Oxfam's allegations remain under investigation in court. If they've got the paperwork to back it up, laughing it off as "a super liberal socialist anti capitalist unthinktank" isn't going to cut it.

State aid ruling shows Apple is the tip of the iceberg in Ireland

EU lawmakers back tax clampdown on Google, Apple

You haven't got a clue about what you are talking about. You are spouting socialist claptrap intended to bring down the capitalist system and you don't even know it. The "EU Commission" you are talking about that is being quoted is the commission on Competition. . . The TREATY that created the EU and which was signed by all the member nations including Ireland prohibits the EU from regulating or involving itself in all member nations' tax laws or regulations!

This Commission on Competition is attempting a backdoor REGULATION of Ireland's corporate tax rates by ruling that their using low tax rates to attract business to establish their headquarters in Ireland is an violation of the EU'S competition fairness doctrine and despite Apple having PAID INCOME TAXES per international standard tax law and internationally Treaty recognized Generally Accepted Accounting Practices (GAAP) rules, the Competition Commission ordered Ireland to collect TEN YEARS OF BACK INCOME TAXES AT A RATE ARBITRARILY SET BY THE COMMISSION!

The commission's charter does not give them the authority to make such an order, nor under the EU are retroactive taxation orders permitted for more than three year and that only by a court of law, the Commission just arrogated it to themselves in violation of the EU Treaty, the equivalent of our Constitution for the EU, but they have clout in other areas to shut down trade if their orders are not followed. Ireland does not want the ~$18 billion in back taxes, nor does Apple or auditors or other tax lawyers agree they owe it, but Apple and Ireland have come to a reluctant arrangement to have Ireland hold the money while both appeal the commission's illegal order through the EU'S court systems.

That money will be transferred soon. . . and the courts will most likely quash the order as it will upend over two hundred years of commercial and international law and totally disrupt the way things profits are taxed in the world because an idiot socialist commission chairwoman with an agenda doesn't, like you, have a clue about international trade and tax law!

Looking at your sources and your seeming philosophy, are you sure you're on the right site? Perhaps you'd be happier posting on a socialist site. You seem to like their positions and data. . . Especially their attempts at destroying capitalism.

Incidentally, your last link's article mentions Apple only in the headline but Apple is never mentioned in the body of the article. Why? One reason is that Apple was never mentioned in the Panama Papers, nor does Apple have a presence in Luxembourg for low income tax purposes. Apple, by law, pays its income taxes in its home country where it is headquartered, the United States of America. Apple is in the headline for one reason only: click bait. Apple in a headline draws readers; that's the only reason Apple was headlined in an article that does not even mention Apple. We see it time after time. Click bait.

18 posted on 08/18/2017 3:59:24 AM PDT by Swordmaker (This tag line is a Microsoft insult free zone... but if the insults to Mac users continue...)
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To: Swordmaker

And you’re supporting a company that holds fundraisers for Hillary Clinton and lobbies to flood the U.S. with illegal immigrants. Very capitalist.


19 posted on 08/18/2017 12:30:30 PM PDT by Fedora
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To: Fedora
and lobbies to flood the U.S. with illegal immigrants

Please show where Apple lobbyists are advocating that. They are spending most of their efforts on the tax cuts. I think you are making an unwarranted assumption. Cook may be supporting that, but Apple is not, except for the tech area in the H-1B Visas.

20 posted on 08/18/2017 4:06:48 PM PDT by Swordmaker (This tag line is a Microsoft insult free zone... but if the insults to Mac users continue...)
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