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After 2020 Loss, Trump's Tax Cuts Endure As Corporations Duck U.S. Debts | The Beat With Ari Melber - YouTube
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if you're a girl from compton don't just
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become a tennis player
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become the greatest athlete ever money's
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gotta be the shoes
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shoe shoes shoes you sure it's not the
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shoes i'm sure
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nike is an iconic company for many
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reasons and in 2020 it made nearly three
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billion dollars in u.s
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profits they did great during this
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pandemic digital sales almost doubled
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the company says they beat a quote
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dynamic environment by staying on the
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offense as ceo
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john donahue put it now mr donahue took
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over running nike after a successful
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stint at bain capital where he worked
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with mitt romney
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and he oversees a nike workforce where
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the median employee makes about
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490 dollars a week or 25 thousand
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dollars a year
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to put that in perspective it means a
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single parent of three kids with the
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median nike salaries living below the
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poverty line
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half of nike's employees make less than
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that meaning
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many of them might work and still need
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assistance to get by
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like those food lines i mentioned
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whether it's from a charity or a second
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job or
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government subsidies as for ceo donahue
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very different story he makes
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over 500 times the salary of his median
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employee
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and in what he called that quote dynamic
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year of 2020 his overall compensation
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was
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53 million dollars this is mounting
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inequality in pandemic america
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and while nike benefits enormously from
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the us government with regulating the
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markets
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systems the mail that ensures nike's
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profitable that this
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products go out companies not paying its
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share at
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all in that same dynamic year of 2020
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nike paid zero federal taxes none
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which is wild a company making billions
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and paying its ceo millions
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is paying our government less than a
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single average taxpayer probably less
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than you
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so where are all those nike profits
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going well
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to paraphrase some rick ross lines about
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the company's product
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count the profits you could bring them
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in a nike box
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grinding in my jordans kick them off
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they might be hot
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ross is saying his own nikes might be
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stolen or hot and his illicit profits
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can be stored in a nike box but
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when it comes to nike's tax money that
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shoebox
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would be empty that's not
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fair to everyone else paying taxes now
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for its part
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nike says it follows the law and paid
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quote significant taxes over the years
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but my point here with you tonight is
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not even to single out nike as some sort
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of special case or outlier
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it's actually the opposite what nike
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does is common it's usually legal
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which raises questions about whether any
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of this should be legal
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55 u.s companies paid zero federal taxes
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on 2020 revenue with other big names in
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that same crew like fedex and dish
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and companies that have had their
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businesses surge as customers face
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limited options while quarantining under
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government rules
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these very figures are facts binding
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cited in that big speech to congress
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recent studies shows that 55 of the
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nation's biggest corporations
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paid zero federal tax last year
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those 55 corporations made in excess
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of 40 billion dollars in profit a lot of
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companies
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also evade taxes through tax havens in
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switzerland and bermuda
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and they benefit from tax loopholes and
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deductions it's not right
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it's a huge problem with customers
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hurting and corporate taxes hitting an
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effective rate of zero
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you could imagine business leaders
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treading carefully here but instead many
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are demanding that whatever the us does
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next corporate taxes shouldn't go up at
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all
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now economists debate all kinds of
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things there aren't always simple
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answers but here's one thing we do know
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corporations pay less right now because
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trump slashed their rates by about
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40 as soon as he got into office moving
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over a trillion dollars
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off their corporate balance sheet so
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that bill goes somewhere else it goes to
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workers or some other part of the system
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trump even told his millionaire donors
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that all his tax reforms would help
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them and he was blunt about how this was
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a wild perk for corporations
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corporations are literally going wild
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over this
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i think even beyond my expectations the
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biggest tax cut
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biggest reform of all time
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going back to just before the aberration
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of the trump presidency corporations
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paid a tax rate above 30 percent
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if you go back to the 50s and 60s many
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paid half their profits in taxes which
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finance roads and schools and the
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military
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but that norm has been slashed over time
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corporate rate falling all the way down
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to this trump rate of 21
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percent now this change was led by
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republicans and some democrats
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supporting deregulation
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it's also interesting to note that top
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democratic leader back in the day warned
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the republican tax crusade would not
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magically save money it would cost so
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much
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that surplus money for the elderly in
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health care would be rated
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it will use social security and medicare
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surpluses
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it will create the same deficit
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situation i promise you
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as we have seen all through the 1980s
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and early 90s
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as corporate rates crash these are of
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course maximum possible rates after
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trump's plan passed the number of
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companies paying zero
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doubled many companies managed to pay
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less than the 21 percent as biden was
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talking about or they pay zero
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with gimmicks employees and lawyer
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tricks many of which are deemed legal
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now some have a financial purpose like
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honestly declaring your losses
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others though are tricks designed for
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tax dodging like moving shell companies
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abroad to get lower foreign rates
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while you benefit from america's rules
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an issue many top democrats have
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hammered
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if anybody here thinks that corporate
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america gives one damn about the average
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american worker you're mistaken
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companies like facebook have kept
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billions of dollars in tax breaks
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through tax tactics like offshore tax
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evasion
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you built something great in this
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country good for you but you did it
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using workers
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all of us helped pay to educate if they
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could save five cents by going to china
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that's exactly what they would do
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pitch in two cents so everybody else
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gets a chance
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unlike my opponent i will not let oil
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companies elect another four billion
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dollars
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in corporate welfare from our taxpayers
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we've got a better path
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so why is this in the news now democrats
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are pushing to fund this new
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infrastructure bill by reforming
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corporate tax inequity they want to
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nudge the corporate tax rates up a bit
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biden pushing for a rate of back to 28
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percent
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and i can tell you tonight most voters
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already support that
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some moderate democrats though are
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saying it shouldn't even go back
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up to pre-trump levels arguing for a
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middle ground they call it of 25 percent
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but here's the thing this entire debate
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is still happening right now within the
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narrow corporate terms set
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basically by trump which came after
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decades of corporate
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giveaways in the 80s it was considered a
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conservative wall street
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victory when reagan slashed those
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corporate rates from 46
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to 34 percent and a sweeping law that
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many democrats and then senator biden
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supported
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this was back in the days of an often
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bipartisan attack on taxes
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the american taxpayers must either bail
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it out
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or someone else will come in and buy it
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out when i
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argued that we should freeze federal
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spending i meant social security as well
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i meant medicare and medicaid i meant
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veterans man i met
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every single solitary thing in the
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government
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the liberals of my party said it's an
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awful thing you're doing joe
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we had not had the reagan budgets that
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we all
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voted on i mean we we could have stopped
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them we would uh
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have a budget in balance right now and
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the debt that's occurred as a
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consequence of those
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reagan additional deficits uh i
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shouldn't say reagan the reagan and the
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democratic congress
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both facts
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reagan and democrats and then senator
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biden back those reagan rates bringing
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corporate taxes down to
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34 percent and remember this is why this
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is so important right now
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at the time wall street cheered that
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as a big victory in a low rate here we
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are
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decades later in a pandemic recession
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where the government has been literally
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cutting these corporations new checks
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and very favorable loans and vaccinating
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their workers
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and propping up the economy and
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washington's entire frame of reference
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is whether to
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keep the trump tax rates in that 20
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percent range
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or bump them a bit it's literally this
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narrow
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most of congress isn't even looking at
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going up to those reagan rates of 34
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percent
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and biden to be clear has changed his
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tax approach for a new world
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he used that big speech to make the case
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for reforming these corporate taxes
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we're going to reform corporate taxes so
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they pay their fair share and help pay
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for the public investments
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their businesses will benefit from as
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well
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now when you see the billionaires who
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run nike and amazon and these big
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companies thriving
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while people are suffering if you
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remember nothing else
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from this walk down tax lane remember
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this
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the billions they have while people
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wait in line for food that's not just
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the way the economy works
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this is the way congress works it's the
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way politicians
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lock in gains for wall street donors
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have been demanding that each new
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administration
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treat whatever past corporate welfare
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they got as the baseline untouchable
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for any new plans and it doesn't happen
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by accident amazon gave 12
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million dollars in political
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contributions just last cycle
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they did it to get something same for
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bain capital that i mentioned they gave
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21 million
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or those big financial firms like
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blackstone and citadel they each gave
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over 40
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million making them among the top 10
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companies for highest
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political donations in the whole country
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they keep setting the terms with
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congress
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republican administrations often lock
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them in these
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companies though have found that it's
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basically cheaper to lobby congress up
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front
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and then avoid paying sometimes any
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taxes later
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so here we are now with even a blue wave
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election
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that handed the senate and the white
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house to democrats but the actual d.c
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boundaries for corporations seem to
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still be choosing between
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the trump-era tax cuts or the reagan-air
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tax rates
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and not much else corporations have
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narrowed the terms of this debate at
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this
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important time congress largely obliges
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and then you have as i mentioned some
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not all but some democratic senators
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saying that even ending the entire trump
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tax cuts
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would be too much when a blue nation
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and a blue government are stuck debating
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on terms set by
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trump and reagan something is seriously
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off and you'll notice by contrast
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debates over social issues aren't caught
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this far
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in the past but this one comes all the
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way down to the money
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and america has to ultimately decide
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even beyond going back and forth
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between parties and these elections at a
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structural level
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america has to decide if it can stick
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with a tax and campaign finance system
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that is this unequal
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and yes this expensive
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hey i'm ari melvin from msnbc you can
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see more of our videos right here or
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better yet
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subscribe to our youtube channel below
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and we appreciate that
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