Reply #12: Haves and Have Nots

[peapod]

The statutory corporate tax rate is 35%. If a company pays no taxes, it is because they have tax loss carry-forwards, or investment tax credits. General Motors pays no taxes, yes indeed. But that's because General Motors has tens of billions of cumulative losses on its balance sheet.

Your statement regrding the "benefits corporations receive from our tax dollars" borders on the absurd. Do you live in a house or in a cave? Do you drive an automobile or do you walk everywhere with bark lashed to your soles? Do you wear clothes or a loin cloth? Do you eat food from the US food supply or do you eat berries and leaves? Have you ever flown anywhere? Have you ever watched television, a movie, or read a good book? Do you listen to music?
Our standard of living in the United States is a direct result of the activities of corporate America, large and small.

The reason that incomes have stagnated for the unskilled, lower-educated lower/middle class is due to globalization, period. Incomes for educated Americans have risen dramatically for the same reason. The unskilled and uneducated in the US are now competing against hundreds of millions of people (Asia, Mexico, etc.) with whom they previously did not compete. That said, everyone in the US benefits from the new, low cost of source of labor, including the unskilled an uneducated.

The answers to your grievances regarding income distribution are EDUCATION, and tax policies that encourage capital formation in industries that require educated labor. There is no other solution to the issue.