[neekb]

Let's put it a different way. Let's assume for a second that the taxes are more or less "fixed" and need to be paid. SO - you can have companies participate to a lesser or fuller extent. The rest falls on us as INDIVIDUALS.

The moral angle here is that companies shouldn't avoid the taxes of the very environment that enabled them to succeed in the first place.

So I think what he's basically getting at is that paying your (corporate) taxes is basically like "giving back" to that system/environment.

That's the way I think about it, anyways.

[joelrunyon]

What if you believe that the actual taxes are overinflated & used improperly?

[neekb]

Then you just joined a very large club. I don't think that means you shouldn't pay them, however.

Also, there are tons and tons of people who complain about taxes but don't do anything about them. Do you vote? Did you ever run for any public position? Did you ever write a letter to someone in a public position making an awesome suggestion, or volunteering your time to help fix the system you think is overinflated? (Just examples, you know what I mean...)

Of course I WISH taxes were lower, I love money! But I also believe that despite it's many, many, GLARING flaws... The USA is the best country on the planet, and I want to support that.

[jasonwocky]

Move? Vote? Write your Congressman?

[icebraining]

Move?

Isn't that what they are doing?

[MereInterest]

Nope. Companies can put a small portion of themselves in a foreign country, then say that that small portion is the most important part. I cannot cut off my big toe, mail it to the Cayman Islands, then say that I should be taxed under their laws instead as a result.

That analogous thing would be for a company to stop all business within a country, which is not being done.

[refurb]

They can't put a "small" portion of themselves in another country, that's why Pfizer was trying to buy Astra Zeneca. You need the merger of two relatively sized (by value) companies.

You know what you need to do that? It's in the tax law.

[joelrunyon]

But can't a small portion of themselves be the most important part?

If it's saving them billions dollars a year - then that "small part" just might be your most important asset as a company.

[icebraining]

Let's assume for a second that the taxes are more or less "fixed" and need to be paid

That's a big assumption.