is a mere $15 billion.

I heard this on NPR this week and wanted to throw up! They justified it by saying it really isn't as much as it sounds like, they have a very high over head cost. Give me a break!!!!!!!!!!!

Charlotte

Isn't profit "profit?  Isn't the figure after all expences...all overhead?

Do you think they will hire more employee's now..
what a world what a world. I have a hard time thinking that's reasonable.
the bb

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That could be good or bad. What was their total volume?

Charlie wrote on Oct 31^st, 2008 at 9:55pm:


And that means, what?

Charlie wrote on Oct 31^st, 2008 at 10:01pm:


Ok

OH MY GOD!!! They made money!

Let's see, why in the hell would anybody want to be in business?  What an obscene thing, making money.

Over $10B of that obscene profit was distributed to the shareholders in the form of dividends and stock buybacks.  $1.6B of that profit was from selling a natural gas business in Germany.

Plus, you can't make judgements on the profit number without knowing jack about the volume of business they had to do to make that profit.

If I make 10 cents selling you a loaf of bread, how is it any more obscene if I end up selling 100 billion loaves of bread?  Come on people, you can be smarter than the BS the media is feeding you.

Their profits went up 42%.  I say congratulations.

The guy selling hot dogs at the ballpark is charging $8 for a product that costs about $1 to deliver, labor included.  Obviously, that is an obscene profit.

With one stand, he can only sell one line hot dogs per game, and this limits his income to the profit of one stand.  To increase his volume (and profit), he hoardes his obscene profits until he can afford another stand and secures another location in the park or expands the one he's in.  He saves for and gets a license to operate a second dog stand.  Things go well and eventually he is selling dogs at 6 stands and has a team of 15 people delivering dogs in the stands.  Everybody is happy.

Now, by expanding business creatively, he has provided jobs and a market for the goods he buys and sells.  Everybody wins.  Maybe he even gets smart (some retailers do) and starts letting the savings he gets by scaling the operation trickle down into the company... bonuses for employees, lower prices for consumers... good things happen.

How much of that obscene profit should the government collect as 'obscene profits tax', and what effect will that have on the man's business?

After paying the new taxes, the man sees that the real cost of the business just grew to negate his profits, because they were obscene.  He did too well and the punishment is the confiscation of the fruit of his labor to somehow 'even the distribution' of profits.There is no motivation to expand or hire new employees.

It's a rhetorical question, but obviously the point is you don't want to tax them at all... it only puts drag on the company.  No matter how you think it will affect the company, I think we can all agree it's not a positive effect if peop

all though off topic... there are still tons of potential tax dollars that are going uncollected. and talk about an industry that rakes in the profits... that's right "Churches" it's all profit and it's all tax free.

I think they would solve tons of problems and go a long way toward balancing the budget and reducing taxes for every individual by adopting one new strategy... abolish the tax exemption status of  all churches.

If your church owns tons of land in any community... offer them the same privilege of paying property tax as anyone else.

just a thought.

with warm regards,
Tony

I have no problem whatsoever with a profitable business paying out dividends to its stockholders from its profits, no matter how large.

However--when unprofitable companies can pay out dividends to their stockholders from federal bailout funds, it commences to stick in my craw.

Multimedia File Viewing and Clickable Links are available for Registered Members only!!  You need to or

"Redistribution" indeed.  If anyone needs to get paid first, it's the involuntary "stockholders" we've all become.

Best,

George

Linda_Howell wrote on Nov 1^st, 2008 at 2:52am:


Oh, go ahead and admit it Linda, you liked it didn't you!   (pssst, hey kid, ya wanna post onother?  Huh, huh?)



-P.

Marc wrote on Oct 31^st, 2008 at 9:49pm:



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Still looks chesty.