Corporations now pay a NEGATIVE tax rate and yet low-infornmation conservatives still think poor ppl are the problem?

You should learn to read your own links. They examined a total of 30 companies in the Huff article. Could it be that those were cherry picked for that reason? Were all of them Obama contributors that got sweetheart deals? The Mother Jones Article was no better. You cant claim that all businesses operate at a negative tax rate by look only at ones who are able to play games with our badly flawed tax laws.

Why is it that Democrats have never proposed a single tax reform that isn't piling even more flawed law on top of flawed law? The only way any real reform can be done is to institute an entirely new system and then make it illegal for our representatives to meddle with it.

Better low information than low education, comrade. Here's the deal...

Never in the history of the world has a corporation or business EVER paid a penny in taxes EVER. That is because...wait for it...businesses are just a pass through. It is the CONSUMER that pays the taxes. <take a minute for that to sink in.> Taxes, like the cost of labor and materials, are built into the prices of the goods or services every business or corporation provides. What this means is that the higher the taxes, the higher the price. You raise the cost of business, you raise the price of their product or service. This is what you low education voters on the left never seem to understand. And yes, lowering costs DOES lower prices. Competition sees to that.

So, who is hurt more by increasing the price of goods and services, even oil and gasoline? The poor and the middle class. Um, duh.

Go read Blackadder's answer, then read it again, then read a book on economics.

I'll try to simplify it for your - Corporations do not pay taxes no matter what the rate is, because they do not keep their profits.

Corporations are owned by you and me - in our IRA's, our stock portfolios, in the mutual funds we own, in the 529 plans we have for our kids' education, in our 401-K accounts, in our TSA's and pensions.

Profit is distributed on a per-share bases to the owners of the companies in the form of capital gains and dividends, and the owners pay the taxes. In some cases, the taxes are deferred (IRA's, Pensions, 401-K, etc) but the money is 100% taxable upon withdrawal.

The profit that is distributed to shareholders is a net profit - profit after expenses. Anything that is not spent is net profit - but how do they get to that figure? By spending money. When they spend money, the government cannot tax it. So they do spend it - on employees, on exploration, on expansion, on research and development, on new markets, on new headquarters, on operating costs - and all of this continues to drive the economy.

If this proves anything, it proves that all the talk coming out of this administration is just rhetoric - it's populist bull that low-information voters just eat up. "Punish the rich!" "Get rid of corporate fatcats!" "OMG - THEY DON"T PAY THEIR FAIR SHARE!"

Meanwhile - take a look at the companies that are called out in this article - one insurance company and ten energy companies. Hmmm ... maybe Obama knows something he's not telling us - or that Republicans have been saying for years ...

My small corporation pays a hefty tax rate. It's the huge corporations like Geico who received $300,000,000 from the Democrats in NY state that are the problem. You see, no one cares as long as Democrats hand it over. It needs to banned on the Federal level, but both parties oppose that. Why, you ask?

Lower the overall rate and eliminate write offs.

Really, a negative tax rate... you do realize that in order to pay a positive tax rate, the corporation has to actually make a profit and the times you are reporting (2008-2010) were smack in the middle of the "Great Recession."

But I understand, you are a liberal and corporations are evil moochers. Got it.

The authors of those articles have made serious mischaracterizations of the taxes paid by the corporations.

I'm sorry, but since when does a person on welfare employ millions of people? These corporation are what provide millions and millions of people jobs. Why do you want it such that they can no longer do that? Unless you think everyone should be on welfare, as there would be few jobs.

ConocoPhillips had $8.4 billion in net income and paid $7.9 billion in taxes. That's certainly not a negative tax rate.

I see you think 11 corporations exist.

Poor people do not pay taxes and the consume the revenue in the form of welfare.