Are These the Corporate 'Citizens' United{?}

{This may not be put together well as I've got some thirty plus years of thoughts rushing through my head, have since watching this last night, as I lived in and watched all this go down and the growth of their total control, not only here but across this planet, as compared to the first some thirty years of growing into and starting in the working professions.}

That own our Government, now are covered under the First Amendment, and 'our' representatives fighting so hard for while now gaining millions in campaign contributions, from their real employers, because corporations are now individual citizens and can give unlimited funds to garner what all they want!

I thought foreign contributions to political campaigns were illegal, that's what all the tepublicans were screaming about any Democratic Candidate from President on down for these past decades!

Are they now individual citizens of other countries as well, buying the political needs not for good business practices but all for the bottom line.

A look at the world's new corporate tax havens

27 March 2011 - Lesley Stahl explains how U.S. corporations are cutting their tax bills by moving business overseas

Our government is in knots over ways to lower the federal budget deficit. Well, what if we told you we found a pot of money - over $60 billion a year - that could be used to help out?

That bundle is tax money not coming in to the IRS from American corporations. One major way they avoid paying the tax man is by parking their profits overseas. They'll tell you they're forced to do that because the corporate 35 percent tax rate is high in relation to other countries, and indeed it seems the tax code actually encourages companies to move their businesses out of the country.

 

Video The new tax havens

American companies are finding new overseas tax havens to legally protect some of their profits from the U.S. tax rate of 35 percent, among the highest in the world. Lesley Stahl reports.

 

While some would watch this and actually think most wouldn't.

It skirts around how few in numbers corporations are compared to the multi-millions of workers footing their bill. That includes the citizens who are now working in these overseas opporations that aren't just postal box addresses. And here think of all the tax breaks given to move to states or even as startups {for ease think of sports teams and stadiums}, many now seemingly going to foreign companies moving here {if our wages and benefits are so high why do they want to move here while ours move all over}, think of all the infrastructure and more built for their needs and then taken care of so as to ease their business needs without disruption, think of the lack of regulating and when something goes wrong they get their hands slapped and move on while raising prices to cover any extra costs incurred bvecause of the damage etc. done, think of how few, if any, are taken to our courts for prosecution for that which regular citizens are readily fire for, indicted for, convicted for, fined and or jailed for.

It mentions the number of execs, very few, saying they are renouncing their corporate citizenship thus theirs but fails to say if they still contribute to campaigns here or live here but maintain, only hints, at personal addresses wherever!

And it doesn't mention the trouble with the economies of these Countries and others as the citizens pay while the corporations reap, nor the workers unrest by the people of many countries!

It fails to mention how corporate funding and our representatives are trying to destroy workers rights as they create a third world work force here in the United States that existed before these hard fought for rights!

Some cuts from the report:

Companies searching out tax havens is nothing new: in the 80s and 90s there was an exodus to Bermuda and the Cayman Islands, where there are no taxes at all.

When President Obama threatened to clamp down on tax dodging, many companies decided to leave the Caribbean. But instead of coming back home, they went to safer havens like Switzerland.

The population of the town of Zug is 26,000; the number of companies in the area is 30,000 and growing at an average rate of 800 a year. But many are no more than mailboxes.

Texas Democratic Congressman Lloyd Doggett questions whether the recent moves of several companies are legit. "A good example is one of my Texas companies that's been in the news lately, Transocean," Rep. Doggett told Stahl.

Transocean owned the drilling rig involved in the giant BP oil spill. They moved to Zug two years ago.

"I'm not sure they even moved that much. They have about 1,300 employees still in the Houston area. They have 12 or 13 in Switzerland," Doggett told Stahl.

"And yet they claim that they're headquartered over there," Stahl remarked.

"They claim they're Swiss. And they claim they're Swiss for tax purposes. And by doing that, by renouncing their American citizenship, they've saved about $2 billion in taxes," Doggett explained.

"I think it was a shenanigan when some of these companies felt so strongly about America that they renounced their American citizenship and began saluting a foreign flag. They exploited a provision in our tax laws and moved offshore," Doggett said.

And a couple of added video cuts from:

Video Extra: Benefits of bringing back cash

U.S. companies are holding $1.2 trillion overseas for tax reasons. Cisco CEO John Chambers is lobbying for a one-time tax break to encourage companies to bring that money back to America.

 

Video Extra: How to shift profits

Economist Martin Sullivan explains to Lesley Stahl how American multi-national companies shift their profits overseas.

 

This is how simple it is for them:

"Or Coca-Cola could take the recipe out of the vault, put it in a Swiss vault," he said.

"And then it's Swiss?" Stahl asked.

"Yeah," he replied.

When a formula or a computer code is registered abroad - say in Zug - a U.S. company is allowed to claim a lot of its taxable profits are there, even if most of its sales are in the U.S.

They want a free ride, and have been getting it while wanting even more from our reps they buy, while everyone else pays for their needs, All Their Needs, even for their big investors who know little about the companies but see their investments grow and pay little to nothing into the treasury of the Country!!