[adventured]

It's often claimed that politics in the US is run by / dominated by corporations.

I find the contradiction in that claim at times like this to be especially dramatic. The biggest corporations in America - Apple, Microsoft, Google, Facebook, Amazon, etc - are actively being harmed by the US Government. US telecoms are having the doors shut to business in Europe and Asia, because of this stuff. Countless billions in profit are at stake.

Another headline from today: corporations are holding $2 trillion overseas, because of the wonky corporate tax policies of the US. If corporations actually ran anything, that wouldn't be a problem.

[Tombone5]

The wonky thing being that they would have to pay tax on that money if they take it to the US, but they've already made all that effort not to pay tax on the income in the country of origin! (sad face)

[adventured]

It's part of the absurdity that is the US tax code.

I think it was Bill Clinton (among countless others) that elaborated how the obvious thing to do, is to compress the corporate tax rate down to close to 20%, and eliminate most of the tax gaming (simplification).

We could continue to tax corporations at a reasonably competitive rate (vs the rest of the world), simplify the tax code drastically, and keep tax revenue approximately the same. That we can't seem to do something so obvious, which has lots of support from both parties, draws a pretty big sad face from me.

[mariusz79]

Poor corporations.. Maybe we should start non-profit to help them survive. You know, each us could donate few bucks to keep these poor corporations afloat. After all what can they do with a few tens of billions in cash?

[TeMPOraL]

Create a Corporate Congress.

[mariusz79]

I knew that you must be one of the "freelancers"...

[shitehawk]

If Apple is actively being harmed by the US Government it sure doesn't seem it as they are making more than they ever have.

[adventured]

The calculations on business lost to the Snowden revelations, is tallied in at least the tens of billions, and it's likely to get more dramatic over time by encouraging new European and Asian competition (to build matching scale replacement services) where there previously was not as much.

[shitehawk]

I would love to see some evidence that Apple lost money due to the Snowden revelations.