stock buyback

note // to ceo pay

milton friedman effected transformation max profit for shareholder, but buyback undermines that BS?

common dr an 12 22

With colder winter weather looming, a new analysis released Tuesday shows that the nine largest energy utility companies in the U.S. raked in nearly $14 billion in combined profits during the first three quarters of this year—and dished out roughly $11 billion to their wealthy shareholders—as tens of millions of U.S. households struggled to pay their utility bills due to soaring costs.

The watchdog group Accountable.US found thatNextEra Energy, Duke Energy, Southern Company, Dominion Energy, Constellation Energy, Eversource Energy, Entergy Corporation, DTE Energy, and CMS Energy Corporation brought in $13.8 billion in the first nine months of this fiscal year. The firms, the nine largest in the U.S. by market capitalization, returned over $11.2 billion to shareholders during that period in the form of dividends and stock buybacks.

The utility giants' massive profits have come at a cost to U.S. households, roughly 20 million of which are behind on their utility payments as providers continue to raise rates across the U.S., pushing home energy costs to unaffordable levels and prompting warnings of a "tsunami of shutoffs."

The Center for Biological Diversity recently estimated that utilities have shut off households' power 440,000 times across 15 states that have made their rates publicly available, a large increase from last year.

"Well-heeled utility company CEOs are holding consumers' feet to the fire with exorbitant energy prices," Liz Zelnick, director of Accountable.US' Economic Security and Corporate Power program, said in a statement Tuesday. "Not because they have to, judging by their own high profits and generous giveaways to wealthy investors—but because they can with colder weather on the horizon."

"To prey on families who use a necessary service with unreasonable and unjustified rate hikes is corporate greed at its worst," Zelnick added.

The Accountable.US analysis shows that the same large utility companies raking in huge profits and paying their executives massive compensation packages are driving price increases nationwide.

Southern Company's Georgia subsidiary, for instance, "had a near-12% rate hike approved in June 2022—and in August 2022, its Tennessee subsidiary was granted a rate hike that would result in typical monthly home heating bills rising by about 25%," the analysis notes.

[twt]

nbc reported in October that "nationwide, investor-owned utilities have requested rate increases amounting to nearly $12 billion from the beginning of the year through the end of August."

Zelnick argued that utility giants' price hikes are part of a broader trend of corporate price-gouging, a practice that companies frequently excuse by pointing to higher overall inflation throughout the economy.

"Like so many other industries during the pandemic, utility companies have chased higher and higher profits and enriched investors rather than keep prices stable for working families," said Zelnick. "While the economy is seeing signs of slowing inflation, it is clear corporate greed continues to be a primary driver of high costs on everything from groceries to heating bills—a problem that won't be solved by the Fed's one-track-minded policy of excessive interest rate hikes that threaten millions of jobs."

Utility firms' greedy behavior throughout the coronavirus pandemic has drawn the attention of progressive lawmakers such as Reps. Cori Bush (D-Mo.), Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.), and Jamaal Bowman (D-N.Y.), who in September introduced a resolution that would recognize access to utilities such as electricity and heating as a basic human right.

The Resolution Recognizing the Human Rights to Utilities has not yet received a vote.

"Utilities are the foundation we build our lives upon," Tlaib said in a statement upon introduction of the measure. "In the richest country the world has ever known, it is an outrage that millions of Americans struggle with utility insecurity, substandard and dangerous services, and inhumane shutoffs."

"It's time to change the conversation around what we all deserve, take the profit motive out of providing the basics of a good life, and give every American the opportunity to thrive," Tlaib added.

an edit bd 8 22

What would the American republic look like if, one day, the fascists just disappeared? What could we accomplish if the people most hostile to bargaining were not stabbing democracy in the back?

It would look like the Democratic Party.

The Democrats, as I have said before, represent the full spectrum of legitimate partisan politics. Along with a handful of Republicans, no Democrat would dare cross the line dividing patriotism and mutiny.

The party itself contains a complete set of respectable ideologies, from Alexandria Cortez on the left, Joe Manchin on the right to the president (and a plurality of Democrats) somewhere in the middle.

As for accomplishments? Well, the Inflation Reduction Act.

And we have Mitch McConnell to thank.

Appalachian pragmatism

The president signed the legislation into law Tuesday. It is, as I said last month, a big fucking Big F*cking Deal (BFD). According to the Post, it includes $260 billion in clean-energy tax credits; $80 billion in new rebates for electric vehicles, green energy at home and more; $1.5 billion for cutting methane emissions; $27 billion “green bank”; support for fossil fuel projects; the power to lower drug prices.

It funds the IRS so it can go after very obscenely rich tax cheats. It establishes a revenue floor for Fortune 500 companies who get away with paying zero percent in income tax. It moreover imposes a 1 percent levy on every stock bought back to gin up share prices.

It’s not perfect, to be sure, but it’s still so good, according to the Editorial Board’s own Jason Sattler, “especially compared to the alternative we were seriously considering less than two months ago. Which was absolutely nothing. Failing to mark and briefly celebrate this monumental achievement … would be a moral failure.”

Overall, the Inflation Reduction Act does two big things bigly. One, it accelerates the country’s conversion from fossil-fuel energy to renewable energy. Researchers estimate that carbon emissions will drop by as much as 40 percent by the end of the current decade.

That’s never happened before.

In the process, the legislation creates whole markets as well as the jobs (9 million, according to the Congressional Budget Office) and profit-seeking opportunities that go along with new markets.

And it locates much of that activity in coal-loving West Virginia.

By investing billions in a white working-class state, the Democrats hope improved conditions might realign party loyalties such that voters across Appalachia reconsider siding with southern politics.

West Virginia, of course, is Joe Manchin’s home state. Nothing was going to happen without his support. Evidently, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, who does not get the credit he deserves, made the conservative Democrat an offer he couldn’t refuse.

The House progressives, who’ve not been shy about expressing serial disappointments in Manchin, quickly turned the bill around, knowing that it was imperfect but also knowing that it would do a lot of good.

So not only are the Democrats representative of all Americans.

They are pragmatic.

Like most Americans.

The moral of the story

We can thank the Republicans for making this experiment in democracy possible. Precisely, we can thank Mitch McConnell.

The Senate minority leader thought he had Schumer over a barrel. It turns out, however, that he just forgot that Manchin is a Democrat.

With his conference united behind him, McConnell had threatened to tank legislation that would support the semiconductor industry if the Democrats pursued the president’s climate change agenda.

After Manchin essentially vetoed that agenda, McConnell greenlit Republican support for the so-called Chips and Science Act.

But hours later, the Post’s Greg Sargent said, Schumer “announced a revived deal to spend hundreds of billions on climate change and health-care subsidies. Now Sen. Ted Cruz seethes that McConnell failed to ‘follow through’ on his threat to kill the chips bill. Other GOP senators ripped McConnell for getting rolled and caught napping.”

The lesson, Greg concluded, is that “procedural hardball” works.

True, but I think the larger moral of the story is that the Inflation Reduction Act is what can be accomplished in a free republic when the fascists are prevented from stabbing democracy in the back – from sabotaging good-faith efforts to solve the country’s problems.

“The real America”

I hope the moral of the story sticks.

Mitch McConnell’s power is proportional to the conventional belief in bipartisanship as the proper means of effecting enduring change. His power is also proportional to the Democrats’ inability to solve problems – a direct consequence of Republican sabotage.

The Inflation Reduction Act proves it doesn’t have to be this way. When it comes to budget-related bills, the GOP can pound sand.

It also proves that the Democrats represent, by themselves, the rich range of political ideas in circulation. As such, the Democrats, by themselves, represent “bipartisanship” in every way but in name.

Republican fascists believe they are indispensable, because they believe only they represent “the real America,” which is to say, a social order created, preserved and advanced by white power. They believe the Democrats, and their yen for multiracial democracy, are a kind of diseased perversion worthy only of contempt, even death.

That’s the other thing the Inflation Reduction Act proves.

Democracy, especially a multiracial democracy, doesn’t need the fascists. It can survive without them. It can flourish! It can provide for the needs of every American, even the Republican fascists who would sell their mortal souls to stop democracy from flourishing.

The fascists can’t live with democracy.

But they can’t live without it either.

All the more reason for the Democrats to go their own way.

https://www.mediamatters.org/cable-news/cable-news-discussions-record-high-gas-prices-may-10-failed-hold-fossil-fuel-industr

amid the ongoing war in Ukraine and the world’s response to Russian aggression, energy prices have been understandably top-of-mind for both news media and the general public. Gas prices reached another record high on May 10, setting off a new round of cable news coverage that coincided with President Joe Biden’s speech on the same day about his administration’s attempts to arrest inflation.

Although cable news shows covering these stories performed an adequate job of explaining how the price consumers pay at the pump is determined by a range of different factors in a globalized market, they also allowed the fossil fuel industry to escape accountability for its role in raising prices, despite the fact that oil companies are intentionally restraining oil production in order to return record profits for shareholders.

Cable news rarely connected record fossil fuel industry profits to record gas prices

CNN, Fox News, and MSNBC aired a combined 48 segments about record gas prices on May 10, with CNN (23) and Fox (19) airing the majority. Although MSNBC had the fewest segments (6), anchorKaty Tur was the only person across all 48 cable news segments who connected record gas costs with record fossil fuel industry profits.

On the May 10 episode of Katy Tur Reports, she asked Secretary of Energy Jennifer Granholm about “price gouging” by the fossil fuel industry, saying: “The president said he'll focus on oil companies taking advantage of the situation. The CEO of a major oil company said they saw record prices. Do you see price gouging as part of the problem here?"

[vid ]

this basic context should be part of the broader cable news coverage of gas prices.

Other cable news segments on May 10 took pains to emphasize how the war in Ukraine, European Union sanctions on Russian oil, demand rebound since 2021, and yearly summer trends have contributed to the steep rise in gas prices and could lead to future, record increases.

However, cable news analysis that day almost entirely left out a key driver of high energy prices: the fossil fuel industry.

Although the specific role the industry played in driving the most recent record gas prices is still being puzzled out by economists, Big Oil has been credibly accused by environmental activists of profiteering from economic instability caused by the war in Ukraine. In fact, multiple outlets published stories about record oil company profits just a few days ahead of the breaking news about record gas prices on May 10, including this from Fortune:

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, subsequent sanctions on Russia and the exit of Western oil and gas companies from the country sent prices soaring, and fossil fuel companies are reaping the rewards.

British petroleum company Shell announced their quarterly profits on Thursday, posting a record $9.1 billion in earnings. That’s compared to $6.4 billion in the fourth quarter of 2021.

Although Shell posted the highest profits, other major oil companies also announced major gains.

BP announced it hit $6.2 billion in first quarter earnings, up from the $4.1 billion reported last quarter. French oil major TotalEnergies also reported a $9 billion profit in the first quarter, up 32% from the last quarter of 2021. U.S.-based Chevron reported $6.3 billion in earnings, up from $5.1 billion last quarter.

A Time magazine article published May 11 was even more stark in describing how oil companies plan to use their windfall profits to line their own pockets, instead of making investments to ease the pain at the pump:

For the most part, major oil companies aren’t going to pour these billions of dollars into climate-mitigation investments like carbon capture technologies. Nor have they signaled any immediate intention to bolster oil production, despite calls from heads of state to do so. Their inaction has spurred U.S. and European countries, which are under pressure to keep fuel affordable, to release oil reserves and replace Russian crude oil and liquid natural gas from other sources. Despite those government efforts, oil prices have stayed above $100 per barrel, sustaining an influx of money to fossil fuel companies that are passing it on to stockholders and investors in the form of increased dividends and share buyback initiatives that drive up companies’ share values.

One analysis from the Wall Street Journal found that the nine largest U.S. oil producers spent 54% more in share repurchases and dividends in the first quarter than they invested in new oil developments. Similarly, a recent report covering the 20 largest U.S. oil companies published by the environmentalist organization Friends Of The Earth and consumer watchdog organizations Public Citizen and BailoutWatch, tallied $56 billion in new share buyback authorizations in the roughly seven months since last October, compared with $11 billion announced in the nine months before that.

Not only is the fossil fuel industry dragging its feet on actions that could potentially alleviate high energy costs for American consumers, but it also continues to profit from the global instability caused by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. In fact, the industry has a long and sordid history of exacerbating geopolitical conflicts for its own profit.

Journalistic accountability demands that Big Oil’s role in this crisis is included in every segment about rising gas prices or increased energy costs – particularly as right-wing media outlets such as Fox News continue running cover for the oil industry while placing blame for high gas prices almost solely on the Biden administration.

Fox is dedicated to carrying the fossil fuel industry’s water, CNN and MSNBC must do better

Since the beginning of the war in Ukraine, Fox News has absolved Big Oil of any responsibility for energy price increases while desperately trying to blame the Biden administration.This included Fox figures mentioning the canceled Keystone pipeline approximately 141 times in segments about the Ukraine crisis from February 22-28, and mentioning “energy independence” or “energy security” – industry talking points to promote more domestic drilling for oil and gas – at least 632 times from February 24 through April 24.

In reality, the factors determining what consumers pay for gas prices are very complicated, and generally, presidents and their related policies have little effect on the price at the pump and little influence over the complex economics of energy markets, absent leading a rapid transition to a clean energy economy. But this hasn’t stopped Fox News from using the situation in Ukraine to bash the Biden administration’s energy policy.

After Biden’s March 8 announcement that the United States was banning Russian fossil fuel imports, Fox News hosts and guests blamed him for instituting the same policy that they had previously demanded– all while praising oil and gas companies as “the greatest industry around the world,” deflecting Biden’s criticism of them as “unpatriotic,” and arguing they are “basically our national defense.”

Meanwhile CNN and MSNBC’s recent coverage has largely failed to hold the fossil fuel industry accountable for exploiting global conflicts and ramping up fuel prices amid their own record profits.

Their last opportunity came during the April 6 House Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee hearing on the fossil industry’s role in driving record high gas prices. Fox News programs devoted 49 minutes of coverage to the hearing, much of which defended Big Oil and blamed the Biden administration, while CNN and MSNBC covered the hearings for only 10 minutes and 4 minutes, respectively. This disparity in coverage effectively allowed Fox to again shape the narrative around climate and energy on cable news. Instead of CNN and MSNBC viewers learning about the myriad factors driving gas prices, including Big Oil profiteering, they were told little, if anything, about the role the fossil fuel industry plays in driving the price at the pump.

Cable news shows must begin holding the fossil fuel industry accountable

Despite the fossil fuel industry’s billion-dollar campaign to erode the public consensus on climate change and its exploitation of the current Russian invasion of Ukraine to agitate for deepened reliance on its products, public polling shows that more than two-thirds of U.S. adults support “developing alternative energy, including wind and solar, over increasing production of fossil fuels like oil, coal and natural gas.” In addition, poll after poll finds that the majority of Americans want the government to take climate action – but they rarely have the opportunity to learn from TV news about the fossil fuel industry’s role in opposing urgently needed climate and environmental policies.

Reporting on consumers facing record-high prices at the gas pump while oil companies enjoy record-high profits presents just one such opportunity for cable news outlets to inform their audiences about these connections and their links to the climate crisis.

Fox News is a key cog in the fossil fuel industry’s disinformation network, so the conservative network will never cover this reality. But CNN and MSNBC can no longer afford to miss key opportunities to bring accountability to the fossil fuel industry, especially as the public demands answers and the window for meaningful climate action rapidly closes.

Methodology

Media Matters searched transcripts in the SnapStream video database for all original programming on CNN, Fox News Channel, and MSNBC for any of the terms “gas,” “fuel,” “pump,” “diesel,” “record,” “price,” “soar,” or “high” on May 10, 2022.

We counted segments, which we defined as instances when record gas prices were the stated topic of discussion or when we found significant discussion that also included discussion of record gas prices. We defined significant discussion as two or more speakers in a multi-topic segment discussing record gas prices with one another. We also counted headline reports, which we defined as instances when the anchor or host read news highlights covering a range of topics. Within those segments, we then determined whether any speaker also mentioned record fossil fuel industry profits.

We did not include teasers for segments about record gas prices coming up later in the broadcast or passing mentions, which we defined as instances when a single speaker spoke without another engaging with the comment.

https://www.alternet.org/2020/08/ralph-nader-ranks-the-infinite-greed-power-and-controls-of-giant-corporations

Ralph Nader ranks the infinite greed, power and controls of giant corporations

The combination of greed and power often spin out of control and challenge the enforceable rule of law and the countervailing force of the organized civic community.

When greed and power are exercised by giant multinational corporations that escape the discipline of the nation-state, the potential for evil becomes infinite in nature. Enough is never enough.

Global giant companies, aided and abetted by their corporate attorneys and accountants, can literally decide how little taxes they are going to pay by shifting profits and expenses among different tax haven countries such as Ireland, Luxembourg, and Panama.

These same companies then proceed to lobby any nation, including most prominently the United States. Congress and the White House are pushed to cut formal tax rates, pack the tax laws with loopholes, and lower further the effective tax rate. The formal top tax rate for billions of company profits is now 21%, while the actual tax rate is lower – much lower for banks, insurance companies, drug companies, and behemoth tech companies like Apple that master tax avoidance.

"Generous” is not a word one can associate either with Apple or it’s avaricious, CEO Tim Cook. One of the first moves Tim Cook made, after replacing legendary Apple Founder, the cancer-stricken innovator Steve Jobs, was to arrange a $378 million, 2011 compensation package for himself and launch the biggest stock buyback in corporate history. Apple, which is worth $1.5 trillion has spent $327 billion since 2013 to buy back 2.5 billion shares of stock. Yet Apple has done little to produce productive investments, remediation of used and very toxic Apple products when discarded, or increase pay for the 350,000 serf-labor workers in China toiling under its merciless contractor Foxconn.

Apple made $104 billion in the last 12 months, puffed up by tax-avoidance, tax cuts and a no tariff deal with Trump on its Chinese imports, yet Tim Cook has rejected pleas to spend a little over $2 billion (deductible) to award a full year’s pay bonus to the 350,000 Foxconn workers who build Apple’s iPhones and iPads.

Apple’s massive stock buybacks have, however, increased the metrics to set compensation levels for Tim Cook and his executive sidekicks. Unfortunately, stock buybacks do little to tamp down excessive prices for Apple products. The massive stock buybacks also send a message that Apple’s management has no other uses for its corporate cash – not for R&D, not for improving the nature and security of its workers’ pensions, not for investing in curtailing the damaging side effects of Apple products on the environment and not for reducing other offloaded damage to society.

Tim Cook and Apple are also stingy, given their vast wealth, with charitable contributions. So stingy that Apple’s bosses do not even come close with the company’s charitable deduction limit of five percent of adjusted gross income. In 2018 Apple gave $125 million to charities. Apple’s net income for 2018 was $59.53 billion – a tiny fraction of one percent!

Recently, the New York Times published articles showing how tiny the executive pay cuts were by the very few executives who announced and declared sympathy for their laid-off and impoverished workers.The media has also been reporting illicit maneuvers developed by corporate attorneys to help chain stores get relief payments that should have gone to legitimate small businesses. (Why isn’t the National Federation of Independent Business (NFIB) speaking out against this abuse and avarice?)

Replacing some of their greed with generosity could be directed to the estimated $6 billion to $11 billion needed this coming school year to give low-income students full equipment and connectivity to the internet for remote learning during the Covid-19 pandemic restrictions. States and localities need $4 billion to assure the voting process will be fair and that all votes be counted and on time. The Republicans in the Senate are blocking the money needed to guarantee free and fair elections. Four billion dollars for the profit-glutted Silicon Valley giants Facebook, Google, Apple plus Amazon, and Microsoft, is peanuts. These high-tech digital giants could easily contribute the money needed to avert a widely predicted election time disaster and weeks of understaffed counting after November 3^rd. Imagine such a show of patriotism from these companies.

Then there are the matters of woefully inadequate supplies, facilities, and training programs to counter the spreading Covid-19 pandemic that is crumbling the economy. These record-setting profitable companies, with soaring stock prices due to their monopolistic powers or consumer-gouging, should return some of Trump’s giveaway tax cuts of 2017 and the burgeoning corporate welfare payments from crony-capitalistic Washington, D.C. to help their afflicted or vulnerable fellow Americans. Many of these people are their own workers, friends, and relatives.

Economists should develop a “Hedonistic Index,” to rank the “greed-with-power” status of the 500 largest U.S. corporations.

People have the right to know how CEOs and major corporations do on the “Hedonistic Index” of greed and power. After all, at the end of the day, we are all paying the price of the full measure of the infinite avarice spiraling from these corporate supremacists and their private governments of control.

https://www.alternet.org/2019/10/another-betrayal-trump-promised-to-bring-offshore-profits-home-but-hes-doing-the-opposite/

an 1019

'Another betrayal’: Trump promised to bring offshore profits home — but he’s doing the opposite

Igor Derysh / Salon

The Trump administration is considering a rule change that would make it easier for American companies to stash money offshore to avoid U.S. taxes, despite the president’s repeated campaign promises…

no lnx

‘Another betrayal’: Trump promised to bring offshore profits home — but he’s doing the opposite

Written by Igor Derysh / Salon October 11, 2019

The Treasury Department is looking to weaken or eliminate Obama-era regulations aimed at preventing companies from moving their income to their overseas branches to lower their U.S. tax bill, Bloomberg reports. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, a former Goldman Sachs executive, instead wants to replace the existing rules with “something more business friendly.”

The move would be a boon to large corporations, who already saw their taxes permanently slashed by the Republicans’ 2017 tax cuts, which overwhelmingly benefited companies at the expense of individual taxpayers.

Prior to the 2016 rule, companies were able to move money to their offshore branches that they could then lend to their American branches, while deducting the interest from the tax bill. The Obama-era rule allowed the IRS to consider these inter-company loans as equity, which eliminated a key incentive for companies to move profits overseas.

Democrats slammed the administration for trying to weaken rules that allow tax avoidance when it should be creating tougher ones.

“One of the Trump administration’s top priorities has been making it as easy as possible for the wealthiest Americans and corporations to cheat and avoid taxes,” Sen. Ron Wyden of Oregon, the top Democrat on the Senate Finance Committee, said in a statement. “Rules preventing the offshoring of corporate profits should be strengthened — not weakened.”

Critics of the rule say it is no longer necessary because the tax cuts made these inter-company loans less attractive, according to Bloomberg.

Mark Mazur, Obama’s former assistant secretary for tax policy at Treasury when the rule was created, disputed that claim.

“On the face, they do slightly different things and so it’s hard to believe that the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act took care of every one of those dimensions,“ he told Bloomberg.

On its face, Republican criticism of the rule simply doesn’t align with reality.Trump had earlier claimed that the 2017 tax cuts would bring back $4 trillion in offshore profits that had been stashed overseas. Through the end of 2018, his claim fell about $3.3 trillion short, Bloomberg reported earlier this year.

The tax law slashed the rate on repatriated profits from 35 percent to a onetime 15.5 percent tax rate on cash and an 8 percent tax on non-cash assets. Trump claimed that the change would bring back $4 trillion in offshore profits, even though banks estimated that only about $1.5 trillion to $2.5 trillion was held offshore by U.S. companies. Corporations brought back less than $670 billion from the time the tax law was enacted until the end of 2018.

Researchers also rejected Trump’s claim that the repatriated profits would boost investment in the U.S.

“Policy changes have a relatively small impact on hiring and investment decisions if firms have relatively easy access to credit markets,” said a 2018 report from researchers at the University of Richmond and Claremont McKenna College.

Instead, companies have been using their tax savings for stock buybacks, in which companies buy back their own stock to return more money to shareholders.

A report from Citigroup found that companies in the S&P 500 spent more than $800 billion on stock buybacks in 2018, far more than the total amount spent on investing in new equipment or the total amount of repatriated cash.

Last year, Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse, D-R.I., and Rep. Lloyd Doggett, D-Texas, introduced a bill that would close loopholes in the tax law to equalize tax rates on domestic and foreign profits.

“President Trump promised the American people he’d end the march of jobs and profits overseas,” Whitehouse said in a statement at the time. “Instead, he’s doled out massive new tax breaks that reward offshoring.”

Democrats again called out Trump for trying to help major corporations rather than workers.

“Another betrayal by President Trump — choosing corporations over American workers,” wrote Sen.Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio. “Shameful.”

ralph says: stock buyback is a way to inflate stock price which leads to ceo bonus for performance,so they claim the earned the bonus [b/c they created value? created greater prosperity in the world, which is not affected materially, in fact there's an opportunity cost b/c that money is going to be hoarded/quaranteined in an off-shore tax shelter, not put back into production of stuff]?

walmart big on buybacks

in 2nd 1/2, links to boeing supermax fail cf william lazonik (sp) new republic art'l?

https://kpfa.org/episode/the-ralph-nader-radio-hour-june-24-2019/

distortion of adam smith

predistribution vs re-

free mkt pretend that mkt/invis hand only rational/objective sys, but author says myth, only exists in law of jungle, strong wins;

apple tech created by govt, stolen/used by apple, $ stashed in ireland no/3 ppl (citizens of no cty?) to hide 9b$ from tax 2012.

https://www.exposedbycmd.org/2018/05/07/take-money-run-trump-tax-cuts-boost-earnings-alec-corps-layoff-workers

Nine major publicly traded corporations that are funders of the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) just reported earnings from the first quarter of 2018. Trump’s recent massive corporate tax cuts were sold as a job creation mechanism, but rather than creating jobs, all nine companies reported layoffs that have recently taken place or are planned for 2018.

At ALEC, global corporations and state politicians vote behind closed doors to rewrite state laws that govern your rights. These so-called “model bills” reach into almost every area of American life and often directly benefit the corporations writing or voting on the legislation.

The federal Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017 — pushed hard by the Koch Caucus in Congress — lowered the federal income tax rate from 35 percent to 21 percent, and the Trump Administration promised that the cuts would cause corporations to invest, expand, and hire new workers, as well as pay bonuses or increase wages.

The Center for Media and Democracy’s analysis of nine companies that are major players in ALEC shows that, even with the tax cut, those corporations have laid off or will lay off employees. Comcast, for example, said it will save $128 million from the tax cut and announced 500 layoffs. Caterpillar reported that it will pay 9 percent less in income taxes, but also announced it is closing facilities.

Eli Lilly reported that it lowered its corporate income tax rate by almost one-third, but announced 3,500 layoffs at the end of 2017, layoffs that are still taking place. Energy companies are expected to be major beneficiaries of the tax cut, but two ALEC energy companies, Chevron and Marathon Petroleum, reported large tax savings as well as layoffs for the year.

The Center for Media and Democracy did not cherry-pick companies to find those that announced both tax savings and layoffs. Excluded were coal companies, for example, such as ALEC members Dominion Resources and Peabody Energy, which are downsizing as coal sales continue to decline. Nor did CMD choose companies that saved money on income taxes because they lost money. The nine companies analyzed below all made large profits.

What the companies did with the profits was a corporate choice. In most cases companies bought back shares, a practice that then increases the earnings per share and the dividends paid to shareholders. The boards of these companies vote for the share repurchases, and directors that own large numbers of shares greatly benefit from this repurchasing.

Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway has already made an extra $29 billion from the tax cut. Most of that is because his companies boosted dividends by repurchasing shares. Berkshire Hathaway owns the Burlington Northern Santa Fe Railroad, an ALEC company.

CMD has written that ALEC member corporations laid off 12,000 workers in 2017.

Hundreds of billions of dollars in tax savings has not slowed the firings. And economist Dean Baker tells us the firms are failing to invest these tax dollars to expand their operations as promised.

Chevron:Chevron, like most oil companies, greatly benefited from the tax cut. Its earnings have grown, and it has credited the tax cut as one reason for the increase.

So far, Chevron has announced 300 layoffs for this year.

The layoffs are partly due to a decision by the company to repurchase shares, thus boosting the earnings per share for wealthy shareholders. “There’s still little evidence that the corporate tax benefits are finding their way to employees,” the Houston Chronicle reports.

Marathon: Marathon Petroleum increased its earnings in the first quarter and its income taxes declined by almost half. The company, based in Houston, made share repurchases of $1.33 billion, which, like Chevron, reflects a decision to increase dividends rather than expand operations and hiring (or invest in renewable energy).

The Houston Chroniclesays that, “Houston energy companies have reported at least $20 billion in tax benefits from the recently enacted tax overhaul, but whatever savings the firms realize will likely go to well-heeled investors rather than support the local economy through hiring, pay raises and expansions.”

Despite a tax-cut benefit and increased earnings Marathon has announced layoffs of employees.

Comcast:According to a company press release,”1st quarter 2018 net income attributable to Comcast Corporation includes a $128 million net income tax benefit because of federal tax legislation enacted in 2018.”

Before Christmas Comcast laid off 500 salespeople, even though it anticipated a tax savings in the first quarter 2018.

Verizon:Verizon paid $1.39 billion in income taxes in the first quarter 2018, compared to $1.63 billion for the comparable period in 2017. It is not known, based on data provided by the company, how much of that tax savings of $241 million is a result of the new tax cut bill, but Verizon earned substantially more in this year’s first quarter; the taxes should otherwise have been higher, not lower. Company earnings in the first quarter were 23 percent higher than the first three months of 2017.

Verizon is closing some of it calling centers, resulting in the layoff of 3,000 employees.

Pfizer:Pfizer reported a quarterly earnings increase of 23 percent from one year ago, thanks in part to a much lower 2018 tax rate.

Pfizer has abandoned efforts to find drugs related to treating Alzheimer’s and is set to lay off 300 employees.

Times Warner: The company paid substantially lower income taxes in the first quarter 2018 versus first quarter 2017. The company does not report how much was from the tax cut legislation or other factors, except to say it benefited from the cut. In the first quarter of 2018, Times Warner increased its revenue by $261 million and its profit by 15 percent.

Times Warner has announced layoffs at many of its properties, including CNN and Turner Broadcasting, but larger layoffs are expected if its merger with AT&T is approved by a case pending in federal court.

Eli Lilly:Pharmaceutical firm Eli Lilly, a sponsor of ALEC’s 2017 membership meeting, laid off 3,500 workers in the fourth quarter of 2017 (2,300 of whom took a buyout).

In its press release announcing its first quarter 2018 earnings, Lilly told investors, “The effective tax rate was 15.9 percent in the first quarter of 2018, compared with 21.2 percent in the first quarter of 2017. The lower effective tax rate for the first quarter of 2018 was primarily due to U.S. tax reform enacted in December 2017…”

Caterpillar:Caterpillar reported an income tax decline of 9 percent in the first quarter 2018 relative to the same period in 2017.

Caterpillar is expected to close some facilities, with an estimate of 800 layoffs.

Altria:Tobacco giant Altria reported a 30 percent increase in earnings per share for the first quarter 2018 relative to the same period one year ago. The company says, “[I]n the first quarter we benefited from a lower tax rate as a result of Federal income tax reform, something for which we long advocated.” Altria repurchased $513 million in shares.

Altria has announced layoffs in Virginia.