[HN Gopher] Tesla Paid Zero Federal Income Tax in 2024, Despite ...
___________________________________________________________________
Tesla Paid Zero Federal Income Tax in 2024, Despite $2.3B in Income
Author : cdme
Score : 264 points
Date : 2025-01-31 22:57 UTC (9 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (truthout.org)
(TXT) w3m dump (truthout.org)
| spiderfarmer wrote:
| This will be the downfall of the USA. With the government filling
| up with grifters, the people and companies who still pay up will
| feel like losers.
| btmiller wrote:
| Yep. Paying taxes is the right thing to do for the country. Yet
| the system gets purposely broken, people lose faith that _any_
| system could work, tax dollars run for the shadows, and the
| cycle accelerates. I don't know what the fix is. We need to
| restore faith, but you need revenue to build faith, and revenue
| depends on established faith.
| normalaccess wrote:
| I'm not sure it's the de facto right thing to do. Recall that
| the USA didn't tax income until 1913, relying primarily on
| tariffs and excise taxes to fund the federal government. And
| yet, the country was doing just fine before that--expanding
| its infrastructure, winning wars, and growing its economy.
|
| The introduction of income tax fundamentally changed the size
| and scope of government. With the current size of federal
| spending, much of it driven by entitlement programs, defense,
| and interest on debt, there is plenty of room to trim the
| fat. Bureaucracy, inefficiencies, and bloated administrative
| costs are all ripe for re-evaluation and the axe.
| etchalon wrote:
| "Doing just fine before that" is an interesting
| interpretation of history.
| peterfirefly wrote:
| The problem was low average productivity naturally
| leading to low average consumption. The problem was not
| low taxation.
| casenmgreen wrote:
| I may be wrong, but I understand this is because the company
| invests all of its income into its business - which means more
| jobs, work for other companies, and so on.
|
| I think it better money goes into the economy, in a reasonably
| efficient way, rather than being taken by the State, and used in
| an unreasonably inefficient way.
| davidt84 wrote:
| According to the article, you are wrong.
| yzydserd wrote:
| Its due to carry forward of net operating losses from previous
| years, stock compensation deductions, and other depreciations
| and deductions.
| xyst wrote:
| Neoliberalism runs deep with this comment.
| okanat wrote:
| This is a neoliberalist forum. All startup ecosystem is a
| neoliberal concept.
| rvnx wrote:
| In the past, they used another technique as well, they used
| corporate money to buy Dogecoin (and some Bitcoin too) to
| justify investments.
|
| Not in a small amount, we talk about more than 1B USD.
|
| https://techcrunch.com/2022/07/20/elon-musk-discloses-that-t...
|
| From a tax perspective, they are spending to acquire assets,
| which is very convenient.
| nickff wrote:
| Not all spending is tax-deductible, I believe that only
| expenses are generally 100% tax deductible on day one.
| Maxatar wrote:
| Buying dogecoin or any crypto, security or asset can not be
| deducted though. Losses can be deducted, and the depretiation
| of various assets can be deducted, but the purchase itself
| isn't considered an expense and can't be deducted.
|
| Otherwise all companies would just buy gold with their
| profits and never pay taxes.
| kjksf wrote:
| Buying Bitcoin doesn't reduce taxes. It's no different than
| investing company's cash into a different currency or bonds.
|
| In fact, when Tesla bought Bitcoin accounting rules for
| Bitcoin were very unfavorable in that the bitcoin wasn't
| valued at the price in a given quarter but, and it's hard to
| believe, only at the lowest ever price. So on paper the
| company could only loose money by holding Bitcoin.
|
| That idiotic rule was part of Democrat's lawfare against
| Bitcoin.
|
| This accounting rule was changed recently.
|
| Also, Tesla never bought Dodgecoin. That Techcrunch article
| is just wrong.
| tdb7893 wrote:
| Doesn't net income already take into account these sorts of
| costs? I thought it was after R&D and construction investments
| and things
|
| Edit: I legitimately don't know (and am a bit confused as to
| the exact thing the article calls income). I just know as often
| an R&D expense I think my salary is taken out before net income
| Hikikomori wrote:
| Or less jobs if they're investing in automation. Tesla likes
| h1b so it's not like most good jobs go to Americans anyway.
| larkost wrote:
| No. If Tesla (and the other companies mentioned) were investing
| all of this money into the business, then it would not be
| showing up as profits. Company taxes are not like individual
| taxes where only income is considered, and spending (mostly)
| disregarded.
|
| Depending on which line on the income statement this is about,
| it is either money that could be sent to shareholders as
| dividends or buybacks, or money going into the cash reserves of
| the company.
|
| And you are pushing a lot of opinion on the "unreasonably
| inefficient way". Governments are often very efficient spenders
| when you look at outcomes, often making private industries look
| awful. Medicare is a great example. It has a expense ratio of
| about %1.3, whereas the estimate for the Medicare Advantage
| plans (where they get to play games about who they let in) is
| that most of those private companies have an expense ratio of
| about %17. Private insurers are generally a bit better, usually
| at about %8.
|
| To put more of a point on this, in the Affordable Care Act it
| was felt necessary to put a cap on the expense ratio of private
| insurers at %20 (%15 for large providers). That right there
| defines the "unreasonably inefficient way" we should be talking
| about.
|
| I am not arguing that there is no waste in government, that
| would be silly. But the notion that government spending is
| generally a waste is not supported by the facts, and is more of
| a religious statement.
| dutchbookmaker wrote:
| It is especially absurd though when you have a business that
| depends on ROADS.
|
| As if the roads just pay for themselves.
| HamsterDan wrote:
| In my state, many of the new roads being built do in fact pay
| for themselves via tolls. I expect that model of financing to
| get much more common now that computers are able to
| automatically read your license plate and issue the toll.
| johnnyanmac wrote:
| Tolls are an easy way to make sure roads are worse for
| everyone. privatizing roads is like, the top 5 worst things
| to privatize.
| iforgot22 wrote:
| Profit means it wasn't reinvested. May be later, or not.
| johnnyanmac wrote:
| >which means more jobs
|
| Not in this case: https://electrek.co/2024/12/30/tesla-
| replaced-laid-off-us-wo...
|
| Pretty sure that wasn't even the only layoff this year.
| erulabs wrote:
| > "hoard wealth"
|
| > No mention of reinvestment
|
| > "Tesla was able to avoid paying ... taxes ... by claiming ...
| tax credits" (presented as bad somehow)
|
| > "We're not backing down"
|
| Where or where is the media coverage that attempts to speak to
| people who don't already buy in to the premise? This isn't
| journalism it might as well be blogging. Congratulations, you've
| made the world more polarized!
| ssklash wrote:
| In what world is a massively profitable company paying almost
| nothing in taxes polarizing?
| 9283409232 wrote:
| Many people on this very website support large companies not
| paying taxes.
| erulabs wrote:
| You have to come into the article believing a ton of things:
|
| 1. Tax credits are illegitimate
|
| 2. Accelerated depreciation is illegitimate
|
| 3. Ownership of productive companies is "hoarding wealth"
|
| 4. Journalism is in a battle with the current administration
|
| 5. Paying taxes is a good thing
|
| If you _don't_ buy into these premises, for which there is no
| argument given for or against, you'll be tilted against the
| author. If you do, you'll be tilted against Tesla. This is
| polarizing. There is no nuance, there is no learning, there
| is no insight.
| jldugger wrote:
| > 4. Journalism is in a battle with the current
| administration
|
| Is this controversial?
| chrislongss wrote:
| Yes, as it should be. Criticize the policies, not an
| administration led by a party you don't align with.
| hobs wrote:
| One of the policies is that if you are at all a
| journalist you are an enemy of the state.
|
| During his rallies he'd literally have the entire crowd
| riled up against the very concept of journalists, because
| they might not suck up to him every single second of
| every single day.
|
| Seriously, where do comments like this keep coming from?
| iforgot22 wrote:
| Maybe it's better to say the current administration is
| battling journalism, in a one-sided way. There's a real
| difference, but it looks too much like splitting hairs.
| kccoder wrote:
| What about criticizing a lawless administration, filled
| to the gills with unqualified sycophants, bereft of
| empathy, kindness, and all human decency?
| johnnyanmac wrote:
| Why not both? The administration doesn't stop this, the
| policies suck and only transfer weath from the working
| class to the elite
| etchalon wrote:
| Not to mention the article completely fails to address
| those who believe that humanity has earned a dire outcome
| for its hubris and any day not spent burning down what
| remains of civilization is a day wasted.
|
| Journalism is so stupid.
| ryandrake wrote:
| How about simply the principle:
|
| 1. I should be able to deduct the same sorts of things from
| my individual income that corporations routinely deduct
| from their income.
|
| If a corporation can legally shield all of their income
| from taxes, why can't I shield all of my income from taxes?
| Corporations can deduct the costs of all the things they
| have to do to make money and do weird depreciation tricks,
| but I cannot deduct the costs of all the things I must pay
| for in order to make my own income.
| SideQuark wrote:
| You do. The biggest of all tax giveaways is the home
| mortgage deduction and tax deduction on employer paid
| healthcare. The tax sheltered things like retirement
| accounts, HSAs, Roths, college savings plans, energy
| credits, home improvement credits, car breaks, annd do
| on, are also huge tax giveaways to citizens. Those are
| the biggest tax breaks in all US law, far larger than all
| of corporate breaks combined.
|
| Then, as a citizen, you have tax cuts for kids, for
| school, for various small enterprises, for local this and
| that by jurisdiction, you do get depreciation on lots of
| goods. I could go on for the thousands and thousands of
| pages of personal income tax law.
|
| Being ignorantly of a thing to arrive at outrage is still
| ignorance.
| ryandrake wrote:
| None of these things, or even the combination of all of
| these things, allows an individual to shield 100% of
| their income from taxes, the way corporations shield
| their income from taxes.
| freeone3000 wrote:
| They absolutely do! Earned Income is a _refundable_ tax
| credit - 47% of all Americans pay no net income tax, and
| some receive a refund in excess of any taxes paid.
| kccoder wrote:
| * excluding payroll tax deductions, both personal and
| employer paid (which is effectively still a tax you're
| paying). They also pay sales tax, which isn't an income
| tax per se, but when you have to spend every dollar you
| make to survive, it might as well be.
|
| Everyone contributes.
| mindslight wrote:
| This is one of the most galling things you realize when
| you start doing business taxes. If individuals were able
| to deduct expenses necessary to earn income like
| businesses do, that would include most meals, full cost
| of housing (not just mortgage interest), most utilities,
| vehicles [0], etc. And there would be no "standard
| deduction" to clear, either.
|
| [0] official IRS policy is that "commuting" expenses are
| not deductible, but practically you declare the principal
| place of business as your home, and then anywhere else
| you go is no longer commuting.
| downrightmike wrote:
| Didn't the Nortel CEO in the 90's get an allowance from
| the company for all that personal stuff?
| iforgot22 wrote:
| I don't believe those things and still don't disagree with
| the author. Because the article is too devoid of real
| information for me to have an opinion on this.
| johnnyanmac wrote:
| context matters a lot, that's your nuance:
|
| 1. tax credits are legitimate. But who is using it and on
| what matters. getting hundreds of millions of tax credit to
| make horribly constructed cybertrucks does not inspire
| confidence. But I did want more EV benefits (those are gone
| now. Alas. "Drill, baby, drill"
|
| 2. I don't really know enough about accelerated
| Depreciation to comment
|
| 3. Ownership of productive companies is good. Keyword:
| "productive". Tesla has been cutting staff, closing
| dealerships, and again with the cybertruck. "profitable"
| does not equate to "productive" in my eyes.
|
| 4. Yes, Journalism for the most part is in a battle with
| the current administration
|
| 5. Always the fun topic to talk about. As a concept, paying
| taxes is good. Any more deliberation into reality may as
| well be its own separate topic. I do personally think
| corporate needs to provide more taxes, but Trump clearly
| disagrees this year (corporate tax cut from 21% to 15%, I
| believe).
| Dylan16807 wrote:
| If they depreciated some assets faster, that only delays the
| taxes by a year or two. They'll still pay.
|
| $300M in tax credits is basically the same as them paying
| $300M in tax and then getting a big check from the government
| for meeting some goal. I don't think it should be treated as
| any kind of avoidance on behalf of the company. Instead,
| check if the government paid that money for something useful,
| and if they didn't then blame the government.
| wongarsu wrote:
| Maybe they assume tax rates will be better for them in
| 2026. Under that assumption, deprecating things now to
| shift the tax burden to the future is kind of avoiding tax
| (or more accurately: the 2024 tax rates).
|
| Given the level of corruption in the US government in
| general and the role of Musk in the current administration
| in particular that doesn't seem unlikely to me
| ipaddr wrote:
| I do think he has inside information that corporate taxes
| will go down.
| aidenn0 wrote:
| I mean you don't have to exactly be a government insider
| to bet that, at a minimum, corporate taxes won't go _up_
| under the current administration.
| knubie wrote:
| At least among economists it is not that polarizing. Most
| agree we should get rid of corporate tax. [0] In reality a
| corporation cannot pay taxes any more than a table can. Only
| people can pay taxes. So who pays the corporate tax? It must
| come from the corporation's consumers, employees, or
| shareholders (or some combination thereof). Raising the
| corporate tax is just a sneaky way of raising tax on one or
| more of those three groups.
|
| [0] https://www.npr.org/sections/money/2012/10/18/163106924/a
| -ta...
| whymauri wrote:
| >Only people can pay taxes.
|
| But corporations are people..? Can't have it both ways
| right :/
|
| Unless I'm missing something here.
| roenxi wrote:
| You could probably get most economists to agree people
| shouldn't pay income tax either; they are a distorting
| influence. Land/economic rent taxes really are the way to
| go.
| dark_glass wrote:
| Yes. Corporations are made of people, and they produce
| goods and services for other people. The people that
| compose that corporation pay the tax, or the people they
| sell to.
| emaro wrote:
| But companies are legal entities, they can buy, sell and
| own stuff. They aren't just a collection of people. They
| can make profit, some huge amounts, and they should pay
| taxes for that.
| machomaster wrote:
| You don't understand that in the US's capitalism
| corporations are people. That's why they are able to use
| infinite money to influence elections (because in
| American CAPITALism, corporations' usage of money equals
| free speech and you can't limit people' speech). Yes, I
| agree, it's absolutely insane.
|
| Google "Citizens United v. FEC" Supreme Court decision.
|
| Conveniently, they are people only when it comes to
| corruption and influence. But not when it comes to rules
| or punishment (like if a corporation killed people, it
| should be possible to give it a death sentence).
| DanHulton wrote:
| > a corporation cannot pay taxes any more than a table can
|
| That's just, like, your opinion, man.
|
| Seriously, they're two entirely different classes of
| things. One is an inert physical object, the other is a
| legal instrument that can collect and retain money, and
| shelter its shareholders and employees from legal and
| financial outcomes.
|
| If I asked the average person on the street, which of these
| two things do you think would be more likely to pay taxes,
| they would look at me like an idiot.
| iforgot22 wrote:
| A corporation can't pay taxes? But they do.
| johnnyanmac wrote:
| >In reality a corporation cannot pay taxes any more than a
| table can
|
| The citizen's united ruling of 2010 disagrees with you, in
| the US at least.
|
| >So who pays the corporate tax?
|
| I don't know. the same one who pays for campaign donations.
| IANAL.
| Aurornis wrote:
| > In what world is a massively profitable company paying
| almost nothing in taxes polarizing?
|
| I mean they didn't just decide not to pay taxes. They
| followed the tax law. They accelerated some depreciation to
| take it now at the expense of a higher tax bill later. They
| took advantage of some government credits.
|
| Corporate taxation is only one point of taxation. They pay
| payroll taxes, they pay sales tax on equipment they purchase
| at their factories, their employees pay taxes when they get
| paid.
|
| Low corporate tax rates are unpopular because the optics are
| bad, but it doesn't actually mean that money is flowing
| through the company and into their employees without taxation
| anywhere. As soon as they do nearly anything with that money
| other than buy more parts to sell, taxes are being paid.
| iforgot22 wrote:
| Something is wrong with the tax law if this is an
| accounting trick that only a few companies can use this
| effectively, which I suspect it is. I also suspect that the
| CEO of Tesla supposedly being placed in charge of federal
| agencies will somehow reduce that future tax bill.
| Corporate tax doesn't have to be a thing, but if it is, it
| needs to be applied fairly.
| kjksf wrote:
| Depreciation schedule is arbitrary to begin with.
|
| Say a company spends $1 billion in 2024 to build a
| factory.
|
| What is the "right" number of years (depreciation
| schedule)? 10? 5? 3? 1?
|
| Whatever number N you pick, tell me why it's more "right"
| than N+1 or N-1.
| Dylan16807 wrote:
| > Something is wrong with the tax law if this is an
| accounting trick that only a few companies can use
| effectively, which I suspect it is.
|
| Yes only a few companies could use this, but the main
| factor here is not really a trick. Any other company that
| sells electric cars and has 0-3% profit could do the same
| thing.
|
| If you get a small tax credit per sale, and your taxes
| are 21% of 3% of your sales revenue, and that makes your
| taxes smaller than the credit, then you don't have to pay
| taxes.
| aidenn0 wrote:
| Tesla pays lots of taxes. They pay payroll taxes om their
| employees, they pay state sales taxes when they sell cars,
| &c.
|
| This is specifically corporate _income_ taxes.
| voidhorse wrote:
| I mean, the website is pretty honest about its stance when it
| claims to be about "the history of political struggle", there
| is also a pop up that states that "journalism is a tool in the
| anti-fascist toolbox"
|
| I completely sympathize with the desire for nuance, the problem
| is, there's an inherent tension between reporting facts and
| providing a nuanced view and galvanizing people into action. I
| think this venue is clearly trying to do the latter. This is
| not meant to convince anyone that this is a problem, it's meant
| to fuel the fire of people who do think it's a problem. Authors
| have different rhetorical aims whenever they write. You can
| challenge their use of the word journalism as a descriptor on
| these grounds, but it's not as though they presented any
| falsehoods. They are clearly writing to an audience. And,
| honestly, when problems really are as blatantly severe and
| bordering on catastrophe as they are today, there's really very
| little value in trying to convince stodgy people who still
| refuse to acknowledge a problem.
| gaze wrote:
| people who "don't already buy into the premise" make up such a
| tiny portion of the audience, that it just isn't worth writing
| for them. Companies paying their fair share of taxes is wildly
| popular, and I don't think it's worth getting bogged down
| writing for this vanishingly small population.
| UtopiaPunk wrote:
| Truthout's bias is clear. That said, I think there is actually
| a lot of value when a society can accommodate journalists with
| clear agendas and ideologies. Truthout is, generally speakking,
| going to be skeptical of large wealthy corporations. That kind
| of bias leads to journalists sniffing out real stories like
| this one.
|
| Don't get me wrong - I don't there the media landscape should
| tolerate only one or a narrow range of viewpoints. We are
| healthier when there is a diversity of angles being pursued in
| journalism. And ideally, high enough media literacy in society
| to recognize lies and low-effort garbage.
| fishtoaster wrote:
| Sounds like this is the result of "accelerated depreciation." As
| far as I can tell, that's a strategy that ultimately allows you
| to pay less tax one year and more tax in a later year. I don't
| have a strong feeling on the value of that particular tax law,
| but it seems somewhat less nefarious than the implied "not paying
| taxes at all."
| cma wrote:
| I'm guessing in a different year the rate will be much lower:
| afterall, he gave away $1 million a day to a random registered
| republican voter in a key swing state to get around laws that
| prevent buying votes and paying people to register to vote.
| bradac56 wrote:
| That was with his money (you know richest person on the
| planet) and had nothing to do with Tesla.
| nativeit wrote:
| I won't argue it was with his own money, but _everything_ a
| CEO does affects the company.
| cma wrote:
| Ah I forgot his money has nothing to do with tesla and he
| doesn't run tesla or have a huge stake in it. And he in no
| way benefits from how future tax changes affect them,
| right?
| hatthew wrote:
| Not an accountant but this is my understanding as well
| m3kw9 wrote:
| Same amount of money now is worth more than in future
| johnnyanmac wrote:
| I think the quiet part here is
|
| 1. Companies see downwinds of a recession, so they want to
| wait for good times to do anything. Actually grow, pay off
| debts, make lateral moves.
|
| 2. companies were banking on administration changes to help
| bailed them out. So far, they seem to have won that gamble.
|
| so there's general truth and then there's speculation about
| used to influence decisions.
| scheme271 wrote:
| I think this is a tax avoidance strategy that may save a lot on
| taxes. E.g. use accelerated depreciation to avoid taxes in a
| really profitable year and then if you have a loss or much
| lower profit in a subsequent year, you have successfully
| avoided a bunch of taxes. Not an accountant or tax lawyer so
| there may be a catch here.
| asdasdsddd wrote:
| That makes no sense, the integral of the tax credit is always
| the total value of the asset so it doesn't matter unless
| there are relevant tax brackets here? Businesses can also
| carryforward losses right?
| johnnyanmac wrote:
| > use accelerated depreciation to avoid taxes in a really
| profitable year
|
| Tesla's earning calls tell me he should have just paid the
| taxes this year, in that case. Welp, hindsight.
| jmward01 wrote:
| Others have pointed out the strategy allows for picking the
| best year to pay taxes and therefore avoiding a lot of taxes.
| I'd add to that argument that the current administration is
| likely to create exceptionally favorable policies for Tesla
| specifically so they really should burn every trick now since
| they are about to get a whole new bag of them. I can just see
| it now, legislation built for Tesla. Of course it will be named
| something like Save The Children Clean Air Tax Credit Act but
| it will apply to Tesla almost exclusively as a way to plow
| money towards loyalist.
| kjksf wrote:
| That only works if you have a time machine or a crystal ball.
|
| When those decisions were made, Tesla's CFO didn't know
| who'll win the election.
|
| Trump will likely cancel the $7.5k EV credit so I don't see
| the "policies favorable to Tesla".
|
| Trump was campaigning on renewing his previous corporate tax
| cuts and making more tax cuts. It's not a secret and not
| specific to Tesla.
| SeanAnderson wrote:
| I wish this article was written with a less biased tone. I'm
| genuinely interested in understanding it better.
|
| As far as I can tell, the article cites two things: $500M tax
| savings by using an accelerated depreciation schedule (unclear if
| they saved $500M _more_ by using accelerated vs a regular
| depreciation schedule, but I assume no) and they claimed $300M in
| tax credits.
|
| The article doesn't address the other $1.5B, presumably because
| it's easier to defend. I didn't read through the 10-K to try and
| figure this out.
|
| I don't really know enough about what an accelerated depreciation
| schedule implies, but, taken at face value, they'd have to pay
| more in taxes in a deferred year which doesn't seem like foul
| play to me. Tax credits seem to make sense for an EV company?
|
| EDIT: I did some learning, woohoo.
|
| Federal corporate tax rate in America is 21%. The $300M in tax
| credits is post-tax not pre-tax. The $500M is a pre-tax
| deduction.
|
| $2.3B - $0.5B = $1.8B
|
| $1.8B * 0.21 = $378M
|
| $378M - $300M = $78M
|
| So, I can't really explain why they didn't owe ~$78M in taxes,
| but I assume rounding and cursory other stuff. The article
| probably didn't call out other, minor deductions, but it's also
| fair of them to not have done so. I was wrong when I said, "The
| article doesn't address the other $1.5B, presumably because it's
| easier to defend."
|
| I think the real thing here is the weaponization of EV tax
| credits as some sort of boogeyman. Personally, I'm all for
| incentivizing EV companies to create in America.
| hatthew wrote:
| I think the point of the accelerated depreciation is roughly
| equivalent to taking a loan with 0% interest. It's allegedly
| zero-sum with respect to _net income_. They get to claim this
| income later, with various benefits, e.g. more cash on hand in
| the intervening period, inflation makes that "debt" less
| valuable later, and it's possible that the corporate tax rate
| will be lower in the future, so the tax rate on "this year's"
| income is lower.
| SeanAnderson wrote:
| That makes sense, thanks. Inflation makes debt cheaper to pay
| off in the future and transitioning into a right-leaning
| government hints at corporate tax rates being more favorable
| in the future.
|
| I guess the caveat here is that it can be adversarial to
| short-term investors since the businesses assets are becoming
| worth less more quickly which gives less time for income to
| offset those expenses. That makes the company's expense:value
| ratio look worse.
|
| I don't think the answer is to say that everyone needs to
| follow a linear depreciation curve. Fancy, new tech
| depreciates much more quickly in its early years than well-
| established tech. So the basic concept seems to make sense in
| some applications and I would assume Tesla has some pretty
| fancy tech that they're investing in.
|
| On the other hand, this area feels a little fishy to me
| because a more accelerated curve limits the ability for a
| government to effectively apply taxation to companies during
| their administration. If companies were able to
| instantaneously depreciate their assets for 100%, assuming
| investors were OK with it, they'd just do that whenever the
| political winds blew in their favor for maximum savings.
|
| It doesn't seem like there's any perfect, one size fits all
| solution. Accelerated depreciation seems fine, and can
| reflect the reality of investing in certain tech, but can
| also be abused by giving companies the ability to cash in
| when the time is right.
| AnthonyMouse wrote:
| The way depreciation works is that a company buys something,
| like a computer, which is a business expense. Then at the end
| of the year, you're out the $2000 that you paid, but you
| still have the computer, which is now a used device and is
| now a year older. So it's no longer worth $2000 but it's not
| worth nothing. Suppose it loses $500 in value. Then the book
| value of the asset becomes $1500 and you have depreciation
| expense of $500. That depreciation is the deduction for this
| year, they don't let you deduct the whole $2000 the year you
| bought it. Next year you can deduct some more, until the book
| value of the asset is scrap or you dispose of it or sell it.
|
| Estimating how much value it lost is subjective so the
| government specifies what percent of the value you can deduct
| each year. Straight line deprecation is when the depreciation
| expense is the same percentage of the original cost every
| year. Accelerated depreciation is when the early years use a
| higher percentage than the later years. In both cases the
| total amount of depreciation is the same but accelerated
| depreciation is often a better approximation for actual
| value. The true market value of a piece of equipment will
| decline more in absolute dollars in the first year than the
| fourth year. It's also what businesses typically pick when
| given the choice, because a bigger deduction now is better
| than a bigger deduction later.
|
| It's not any kind of tax dodge at all, it's just an
| accounting method in the tax code.
| gonzobonzo wrote:
| > Tax credits seem to make sense for an EV company?
|
| That's one of the things that I've found odd. A lot of people
| that very strongly support things like tax credits for EV cars,
| in order to fight climate change, will then turn around and
| talk about how terrible they are when they're actually used,
| such as in the article here. A lot of times people don't seem
| to have a consistent view of what they actually want, and will
| be outraged by the results of policies they themselves
| supported.
|
| One can only imagine the headlines if these environmental
| credits were cancelled ("anti-environmental actions are going
| to bring about climate change and doom us all").
| dhc02 wrote:
| I may be the only one, but I was under the impression this
| whole time that all EV tax credits were for consumers who buy
| EVs, not companies who sell them.
| staticlink wrote:
| It amounts to the same thing, no?
| sudosysgen wrote:
| Definitely not, no. Credits on profits incentivize short
| term profit taking, while credits in products incentivize
| number of units shipped. The second is much better for
| society. Think about it from the perspective of a company
| deciding between selling low margin cheap EVs in the
| short term before process efficiencies kick in, or
| selling expensive EVs now.
| missedthecue wrote:
| The idea is to stimulate both supply and demand. Credits
| for consumer only stimulate demand which may not be
| enough to compel literally hundreds of billions of
| dollars worth of CapEx, not to mention opportunity cost.
| sudosysgen wrote:
| Consumer credits stimulate demand by increasing the cost
| consumers are willing to pay for a vehicle, shifting the
| demand curve, and greatly increasing the profitability in
| selling cars, provided it is done at scale. It can most
| definitely compell hundreds of billions of dollars of
| CapEx, and in many ways it's more effective than a tax
| break, because it will reduce losses if the venture never
| ends up being profitable (unlike a tax break which will
| only be worth it if the venture is eventually profitable,
| so there is less risk), and if it provides future market
| share through investments in the low end, especially in
| international competition, it can end up spurning more
| CapEx as it makes the more capital-intensive strategy
| more viable.
| AnthonyMouse wrote:
| It isn't a tax credit for making profits. It's a tax
| credit for making EVs. The reason there are credits for
| both consumers and manufacturers is that the manufacturer
| credits provide an incentive to build EV factories in the
| US, even if some of the cars are for export.
| sudosysgen wrote:
| But we don't care about more profits, we care about more
| EVs. If you want to create an incentive to make EVs that
| are exported then you can make one, for example by
| subsidizing production equipment or by providing a per-
| unit sold refundable tax credit.
| AnthonyMouse wrote:
| > But we don't care about more profits, we care about
| more EVs.
|
| Which is why the tax credit is for making EVs.
| johnnyanmac wrote:
| you're just circling back to the GP's last comment,
| without refuting that comment.
|
| >Credits on profits incentivize short term profit taking,
| while credits in products incentivize number of units
| shipped. The second is much better for society.
| blake1 wrote:
| There were vehicle sourcing credits in the Inflation
| Reduction Act, which are granted per kWh of battery with
| sufficient domestic mineral content. Was $4,000/vehicle if
| I recall.
| 486sx33 wrote:
| lol! No no, this America! Automakers are actually buying
| and selling EV credits to eachother. Tesla often would have
| been in a loss position and possibly bankrupt if the big 3
| auto makers weren't buying credits from Tesla so they could
| get their fleet averages down and keep making trucks and
| SUVs.
| cco wrote:
| They are, but typically what automakers will do is assume
| the tax credit on your behalf and just give you $7,500 off
| the price of your car up front. They will then collect
| $7,500 come tax day.
|
| That's a win-win all around, the consumer saves $7,500 off
| the list price up front, they have to finance less etc, and
| Tesla gets a tax credit.
| zelon88 wrote:
| In reality, what is more damaging for the environment?
|
| Replacing a 2019 Toyota Rav4 with a 2025 Tesla in North
| America, or.....
|
| Replacing a 1985 VW Jetta with a 2019 Toyota Rav4 in India?
|
| I see YouTube videos all the time where people in third world
| countries are using turn of the century hit-and-miss engines
| to power things like water pumps or machine tools. These
| countries are leaking countless gallons of oil and fuel into
| the ground using engines and equipment that are over 100
| years old when Habor Freight sells brand new engines for
| $150.
|
| To me, the ease with which you can sell a new car to a yuppy
| in the USA (who doesn't even need a new car) is baffling.
| Dollar for dollar, there is so much low hanging fruit. Don't
| get me wrong, I want to see first world countries lead the
| charge, but yuppys need to be more realistic in their
| "environmental" decision making. There is nothing frugal or
| environmental about having a 20" touch screen in the dash, or
| replacing your >5 year old car.
| bryanlarsen wrote:
| The American Rav4 is probably doing a lot more miles/year
| than the Indian Jetta. So it'll emit a lot more CO2.
| Negitivefrags wrote:
| Every car that is sold retires an old one. And the one it
| retires will be the least valuable.
|
| This happens becauase the person who buys a new car sells
| their old one to someone else, who sells their old one to
| someone else, and so on down the chain.
|
| The oldest cars from America go to other cheaper markets
| replacing the cars in use there.
| ponty_rick wrote:
| I don't think anyone in India is buying old American cars
| skissane wrote:
| Especially since India drives on the left, and hence uses
| right-hand drive vehicles. American vehicles are almost
| all left-hand drive, which are illegal to drive in India
| - you'd either have to pay for an expensive conversion,
| or manage to get a rare legal exemption (reserved for
| historical vehicles, foreign diplomats and official
| visitors, and other such special cases) [0]
|
| You can import used cars into India, but you'd generally
| be bringing them in from a left-hand drive market such as
| Japan, Australia or the UK. Plus, Indian law says import
| used cars have to be less than three years old, because
| India doesn't want to become a dumping ground for other
| countries old vehicles (which also undermines their local
| car manufacturing sector) [1]
|
| [0] https://auto.hindustantimes.com/auto/cars/g20-summit-
| can-one...
|
| [1] https://www.acko.com/car-guide/how-to-import-foreign-
| cars-to...
| 2muchcoffeeman wrote:
| Does this actually happen?
|
| With some exceptions, there's going to be a point where a
| used car is not worth the trouble to ship it somewhere.
|
| And Americans love their huge ass cars. I can't see many
| cheaper markets wanting to use an American car, just for
| the fuel cost alone.
|
| I bet the cars get trashed for scrap or parts.
| Kirby64 wrote:
| > Does this actually happen?
|
| Absolutely it does. If you live near the Mexican border
| of the US, it's extremely common to see older cars being
| towed headed south, presumably to Mexico. It's not
| particularly expensive to drive them down to the border.
|
| > I bet the cars get trashed for scrap or parts.
|
| Only the least valuable and oldest ones that other
| countries don't work. That means you're overall moving up
| the modernness of the fleet. Presumably with better fuel
| economy, lower emissions, and fewer problems.
| boulos wrote:
| > presumably to Mexico.
|
| Also to Belize and other parts of Central and South
| America. They don't all stop in Mexico.
| Kirby64 wrote:
| True enough. I suspect many aren't going to South America
| since you can't drive them there... but you can certainly
| drive all the way to Panama. If you want to head past
| Panama seems like it'd be easier to ship them directly
| from the US to their final destination.
| ribosometronome wrote:
| >Every car that is sold retires an old one.
|
| I'm about to purchase my first car, a Tesla! Whose
| vehicle will be retired by my purchase?
| shagmin wrote:
| Someone who has already bought their last car and it ends
| up sitting in a garage forever.
| mindslight wrote:
| > _The oldest cars from America go to other cheaper
| markets replacing the cars in use there._
|
| Why are you assuming other cars are being replaced? Those
| other markets are not at saturation. What is being
| replaced could very well be a bicycle.
| iforgot22 wrote:
| The efficiency improvements are generally going to start in
| the more developed countries and eventually reach
| elsewhere. But this is less certain with EVs.
| jefftk wrote:
| _> These countries are leaking countless gallons of oil and
| fuel into the ground using engines and equipment that are
| over 100 years old_
|
| Pre-1925 engines must be a minuscule fraction of all
| engines in active use, even in poor countries.
| sho_hn wrote:
| "India is on track to become the largest EV market by 2030,
| with rise in investment over the next 8-10 years."
|
| https://www.ibef.org/industry/electric-vehicle
| roenxi wrote:
| I'd imagine that they are different people. Arguing with
| crowds can be a bit frustrating because the crowd will argue
| strongly in favour of something, then the winds shift and the
| crowd argues strongly against it without anyone really
| changing their minds. Ditto strongly believing contradictory
| things.
|
| If we want to talk specifically about social media sites like
| HN, the conversation is really steered by the up/down votes
| rather than the people in the threads. Every possible
| perspective tends to get a comment then the gestalt decides
| which ones they like. The upvoters anonymous and the
| downvoters are often ... a weird crew with motives that are
| often hard to divine.
| Aurornis wrote:
| > The article doesn't address the other $1.5B
|
| $2.3 billion was the income, not the tax bill.
|
| Presumably $500M accelerated depreciation and $300M of tax
| credits covered the effective tax bill on $2.3B income.
| SeanAnderson wrote:
| How would $800M in deductions cover $2.3B income to the tune
| of a 0% tax rate? Wouldn't they still be on the hook to pay
| taxes on $1.5B or is it not that simple?
|
| EDIT: Oh, apparently tax credits aren't pre-tax. So if their
| tax liabilities on $2.3B were $300M then they'd owe $0.
| Aurornis wrote:
| > Oh, apparently tax credits aren't pre-tax.
|
| Yes, tax credits reduce the tax bill, not the taxable
| income.
| epa wrote:
| When you spend money on manufacturing and equipment, a company
| does not get to write off the full amount against their taxes
| when they buy it - they may have to spread it over a period of
| useful life of that equipment.
| scarab92 wrote:
| Unfortunately, accounting is full of concepts like this.
|
| Ideas which conceptually make accounting "better reflect" the
| real word, but in reality add a lot of complexity for very
| little benefit. Getting rid of accrual accounting and simply
| allowing full expensing of asset purchases with losses to
| carry over to the next tax period would save everyone a lot
| of headaches, for a negligible reduction in government tax
| revenue.
|
| It would also make a lot of accountants redundant, which is
| probably the main reason they oppose streamlining accounting
| practices.
| _DeadFred_ wrote:
| Tesla's a crypto company. 25% of Tesla's earnings last quarter
| were crypto:
|
| https://cointelegraph.com/news/tesla-600-million-bitcoin-gai...
| Dylan16807 wrote:
| That's multiple years of increase being accounted for all at
| once.
| _DeadFred_ wrote:
| So you're saying 25% of Tesla's earnings last quarter
| wasn't even earned last quarter and wasn't related to
| anything Tesla as business did?
| Dylan16807 wrote:
| Yeah, pretty much. The value increase of Tesla's bitcoins
| since 2021/2022 was being ignored for accounting purposes
| until just now.
| freeone3000 wrote:
| It was due to the change in IRS guidance on how to
| account for increases in value in cryptocurrency -- in
| short, treating it closer to a forex exchange (where the
| value is continually accounted) instead of a securities
| transaction (where the value is accrued when sold). The
| value then had to be retroactively accounted for.
| iforgot22 wrote:
| Simpler alternative to figuring out the accounting tricks and
| 1-year deferred taxes: Amortizing their earnings and taxes for
| the past ~5 years.
| johnnyanmac wrote:
| >I think the real thing here is the weaponization of EV tax
| credits as some sort of boogeyman.
|
| It's a hot topic right now since Trump just ended the EV
| credits. Which you'd think Musk would want to keep.
|
| And beyond this article, Musk has "quiet quit" on Tesla as a
| car company, based on his earning calls. They said little about
| cars and instead deflected the hype to "AI robots" in 2027.
| It's all just so weird.
| andreygrehov wrote:
| > Sharon Zhang is a news writer at Truthout covering politics,
| climate and labor.
|
| In other words, no experience with how corporate taxes work.
| snypher wrote:
| If 0% is how they work, then they don't work.
| linksnapzz wrote:
| How much in taxes should you pay on a loss?
| sangnoir wrote:
| Is this a trick question about Hollywood accounting?
| roenxi wrote:
| It isn't Hollywood accounting, it is just that Tesla
| isn't very profitable once the proper accounting is done.
| If you tax profits and companies don't have a lot of them
| then they won't pay taxes. Particularly if the government
| puts tax incentives in place to encourage people to go in
| to solar and EVs.
| jmward01 wrote:
| I guess that explains why Elon is so poor and the company
| is valued at practically nothing compare to all other
| automakers.
| lesuorac wrote:
| I urge you to check out the valuation of $Fartcoin.
|
| The value of an speculative item is not linked to it's
| yield.
| roenxi wrote:
| Valuation != profits. Tesla's profits do not explain
| Musk's wealth, people have been pointing out for years
| that the valuations of companies like Tesla make little
| sense. There was a long stretch of many years where they
| were bleeding red ink like crazy with not much to show
| for it.
|
| The tax system works on accounting reality, not the
| opinions of stock traders.
| bmicraft wrote:
| But it _is_ profit, just without directly paying it out.
| lesuorac wrote:
| But that's the thing, if I take my entire salary and lose
| it gambling I still owe the government taxes.
|
| I the person am taxed on revenue.
|
| If instead I have a corporation handle everything then I
| can come up with (relatively simple) systems so that I
| don't pay taxes and the corporation doesn't pay taxes
| either.
| linksnapzz wrote:
| Gambling isn't considered an investment. It's
| consumption.
| ribosometronome wrote:
| You asked:
|
| >How much in taxes should you pay on a loss?
| kjksf wrote:
| It was implied that the loss here was defined as
| difference between corporate revenues and expenses.
|
| This concept doesn't apply to personal income taxes and
| gambling losses.
| johnnyanmac wrote:
| yes yes, different rules for the rich than the working
| class.
|
| That is true, but not just.
| kccoder wrote:
| Plenty of people experience a net loss after paying for the
| goods, services, and amenities required to keep themselves
| and their families alive.
| noselasd wrote:
| What if they pay more taxes in the future by using a system
| for paying less take this time?
| downrightmike wrote:
| There is no future, only today, short terms results
| refurb wrote:
| That's seems like a claim not root in an understanding of how
| businesses work.
|
| If a company invest $3B to become profitable, it seem
| entirely logical that they can use those expenses to offset
| any future profit.
|
| If you don't don't do that, companies that require large
| investments to become profitable simply won't exist.
| mellow-lake-day wrote:
| Taxes are part of politics
| cozzyd wrote:
| Hmm I have an idea for how DOGE can raise more revenue...
| analog31 wrote:
| By raising taxes, such as tariffs.
| blackeyeblitzar wrote:
| Are we still doing this in 2025? The same complaints were brought
| up about Amazon years ago. Companies can have no income tax
| liability based on the tax credits they get (for R&D or numerous
| other possible reasons), the way they depreciate assets, how
| their profits and losses are managed from an accounting
| perspective, etc. It doesn't mean there is anything wrong
| happening. In fact it probably means the right thing is happening
| - companies typically are able to lower tax liability by doing
| things we incentivize them to do.
| lvl155 wrote:
| You know what's ironic is that Tesla survived because of Obama
| era subsidies. They were desperate to get one private enterprise
| to succeed because so many solar and other "clean" energy private
| ventures failed during that period. So, in my view, Obama created
| Elon. Now the rest of America has to deal with it in addition to
| the abject failure that is PPACA which ballooned US healthcare
| costs (not that Republicans have any alternative solutions or the
| desire to fix it).
| TheGamerUncle wrote:
| Dang are we back to the years of the "Thanks Obama" I guess we
| truly live at the end of history and have no option but to
| rehash the classics, don't we ?
| lvl155 wrote:
| Sorry for the political comment but every time I see Tesla
| financials I think "this company should've failed in 2014
| but-for those subsidies and ill-conceived carbon credits."
| OnlineGladiator wrote:
| And the only reason most domestic airlines, car
| manufacturers, and some of the largest financial
| institutions still exist is because of multiple bailouts.
| It's not like Tesla is unique in being helped by the
| government.
| roenxi wrote:
| Indeed. If the government makes a habit of bailing out
| all the failures, eventually the system will be dominated
| by failures because they never get cleaned out.
|
| Still doesn't imply that bailing out failures was a good
| idea though.
| iforgot22 wrote:
| I'll stop "thanking" Obama for the ACA when health premiums
| go back to something sensible. But honestly I liked
| everything else about him.
| analog31 wrote:
| ACA was not intended to address costs. It was a compromise
| to expand access without threatening the insurance
| industry. A more comprehensive reform had just failed.
| johnnyanmac wrote:
| Let's think a lot more widely here: how many things in your
| life suddently got explosively more expensive over a
| decade. How many of those do you think would have not
| surged if it wasn't for [insert single thing here]?
|
| It's the same logic people use to suppress minimum wage.
| But prices keep going up. Almost like that's not as big a
| factor as we thought.
| downrightmike wrote:
| Obama didn't make the Grifter, the grifter has a long history
| of grifting.
| kjksf wrote:
| In 2024 Tesla sold more cars than Audi, employs 120 thousand
| people and accumulated $30 billion of cash from yearly cash
| flow.
|
| But yeah, the guy that runs that company is a grifter.
| johnnyanmac wrote:
| how many did he lay off in 2024? How many recalls did they
| have? How much did he spend to buy the election?
|
| if all you care about is raw numbers, you'll fall for the
| grift everytime.
| oskarkk wrote:
| Also, under Obama SpaceX got it's first big contracts from
| NASA, without which SpaceX wouldn't exist today. That was a
| risky bet then, but the government got a really good return on
| that investment.
| kjksf wrote:
| > so many solar and other "clean" energy private ventures
| failed during that period
|
| You can't even see you contradict yourself.
|
| If all companies were supported by Obama but they all failed,
| but not Tesla, it wasn't Obama who made companies succeed but
| Musk who made Tesla succeed.
|
| Not to mention you fail to enumerate those supposed subsidies.
|
| The only significant think I know about is $465 million LOAN in
| 2010, which Tesla quickly and fully paid off.
|
| Compare that to $13.4 billion loan to GM in 2008 from Bush and
| additional $50 billion in 2009 to bail them out from
| bankruptcy.
|
| The Government (i.e. tax payers) lost $10 billion.
|
| GM would surely not exist if not for the tens of billions of
| loans.
|
| Musk would probably find a way to make Tesla work even without
| the $465 million loan.
|
| I hope you see how biased your take is.
|
| You harp on Tesla benefiting from gov support while ignoring
| that many other companies also get support and direct
| competitors like GM got 20x more support.
| johnnyanmac wrote:
| >it in addition to the abject failure that is PPACA which
| ballooned US healthcare costs (not that Republicans have any
| alternative solutions or the desire to fix it)
|
| quite an understatement: they broke it whlie Obama was still in
| office.
|
| regardless, the idea was good but good ideas always have bad
| actors. It's easy to forget that Musk of 2008 had a very
| different image compared to Musk of today.
| wnevets wrote:
| Why pay taxes when you can just buy the Whitehouse? It's so much
| cheaper.
| kjksf wrote:
| The tax rules used by Tesla in 2024 were applicable to all
| companies and if Democrats wanted different rules, they could
| have changed in 2020-2023.
|
| But why make sense when you can opine. It's so much easier.
| wnevets wrote:
| Did every CEO actively campaign for the current president?
| I'm curious tho were you upset when the "twitter files" were
| released and found out that the Biden campaign asked for
| hunter's dick pics to be removed?
| anon-3988 wrote:
| Can a private citizen do the same things that companies do?
| People reinvest in themselves too.
| normalaccess wrote:
| They can, it's just that most people don't have the savvy to
| pull it off.
| declan_roberts wrote:
| Yes if you have business income. In fact it's common.
| steve_adams_86 wrote:
| If you're using business income to invest in yourself as an
| individual, that's pretty illegal where I live. Maybe it's
| different where you are.
|
| The extent to which I can invest in myself is using business
| supplies or equipment for personal tasks here and there.
| Like, print some things or use some software I didn't pay
| taxes on.
|
| I know some people go as far as driving their work vehicles
| around, but that's totally illegal both in terms of insurance
| and tax purposes here.
| xyzzy123 wrote:
| Check out Hess v Commissioner.
|
| For certain types of businesses the individual is almost
| indistinguishable from the business.
| lesuorac wrote:
| To save people the trouble.
|
| > The relevant ruling on this subject came in 1994 in a
| case known as Hess v. Commissioner. The plaintiff, a
| self-employed exotic dancer, had implants that expanded
| her bust size to the size 56FF. For tax purposes, she
| treated these as a deductible business expense on her
| schedule C. The IRS contested her deduction.
|
| > ... The courts ruled in her favor:
|
| https://taxfoundation.org/blog/how-breast-implant-size-
| relev...
| johnnyanmac wrote:
| So many comments to make about that situation.
|
| But that aside, it seems to make sense to make the
| business and person the same when the business is you. No
| one else can truly replace that exotic FF dancer. Her
| clients die with her, and won't truly be replicated no
| matter what.
|
| Odds are someone can be trained to do your paperwork and
| run your business. That may be the distinctive factor.
| etchalon wrote:
| Not legally.
| kstrauser wrote:
| Sure, especially if they own a corporation. My wife's business
| was a net loss for a couple of years during COVID. We scrounged
| by on my salary so she could keep her employees and not close
| down for good. It got better, but our net income was negative
| even though we had what looked like a decent chunk of revenue.
| I'm glad we were taxed on net, not gross.
| ribosometronome wrote:
| They were asking about private citizens, not corporations.
| Your wife isn't a corporation, is she?
| downrightmike wrote:
| Dude should've wifed Google
| xnx wrote:
| Dupe: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42885688
| declan_roberts wrote:
| Absolute trash article written by somebody with an axe to grind,
| probably because of Elon's political visibility.
|
| This is standard practice for all growth companies because they
| are reinvesting (spending) the profits to grow.
| idunnoman1222 wrote:
| Itt feeding the trolls @ truthout
| kemotep wrote:
| A Single Tax regime aka the Land Value Tax would make these
| articles a thing of the past.
|
| We could solve the deficit, pay down our debts and many people
| would pay less in taxes, if we eliminated all taxes and replaced
| them with a Land Value Tax.
| kstrauser wrote:
| So if I were a trillionaire with a reasonable home, I'd pay the
| same taxes as my neighbor? Sign me up!
| kemotep wrote:
| You would only be taxed based on your land use so yes. Labor
| and Capital would not be taxed only Land.
| kstrauser wrote:
| That sounds like a terrible idea.
| kemotep wrote:
| It's a radical idea but with there being 1.4 billion
| acres of private property in the United States, at an
| average of $10,000 per acre for a Land Value Tax would
| raise 14 Trillion. Divided between the States and Federal
| Government, that would cover the 6.75 Trillion Dollar
| budget including the over 700 Billion Dollar deficit.
| With one single Tax that for many people would be a
| massive tax cut. We would balance the budget and could
| begin paying down the debt.
|
| How is that a terrible idea?
| BenjiWiebe wrote:
| Pretty sure that would immediately put every farmer out
| of business.
| kemotep wrote:
| I did say average. Land in the middle of nowhere Nebraska
| is already dirt cheap compared to land in downtown
| Manhattan and agriculture is a productive use of the
| land. A Land Value Tax ideally targets the _unimproved_
| value of land. Farming would reduce the unimproved value
| and lower the tax burden.
|
| It would be the McMansions in suburbs that would be more
| onerously taxed if anything.
| bmicraft wrote:
| Sounds a lot like you want to drive "The Poors" out of the
| city, because that would be how you'd do it.
| kemotep wrote:
| An average of 10,000 dollars per acre, when multi-family
| houses and apartments fit several families, if not dozens or
| hundreds into a single acre, aka how high density and
| efficient land use in cities work, they would pay little if
| nothing in a LVT and have no income tax. It's people who have
| several acres in high value areas or hundreds of acres not
| being used for productive agriculture, the Rich, who would
| pay millions in taxes.
|
| If an acre of land in New York City was 1 million dollars per
| year with a LVT, a high rise apartment with 100 units would
| have people paying 10,000 per year for their share. That
| would be a tax cut for many people.
|
| Yes, grandma in the Bay Area in a massive McMansion on a
| fixed income would be displaced but that land use was
| inefficient and they were not paying their share of property
| taxes today under our current system anyway thanks to
| California property taxes.
| normalaccess wrote:
| These topics always remind me of this Dave Chappelle skit.
|
| The system IS rigged, and everyone knows it.
| https://www.youtube.com/shorts/lNi9DIVkXpo?feature=share
| swframe2 wrote:
| trump spreads his income perfectly across all his LLCs. Their
| expenses always exactly match their income to the penny. I wonder
| why he is able to do that?
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| The d
| icameron wrote:
| I'm still shocked that Tesla income is just 2.3B, compared to
| like, Meta who reports 62.3B net income. I didn't realize how
| tiny Tesla is for the amount of media attention and stock
| valuation they have. Even amongst automakers they are tiny.
| Toyota had like 32B net income.
| TheAlchemist wrote:
| You're in for quite a surprise if you thought Tesla is remotely
| comparable to other Big 7 companies.
|
| Tesla is barely profitable at all, and if Trump ends EVs
| subsides Tesla will be severely bleeding money.
|
| It's the quintesential meme stock.
| oskarkk wrote:
| Where did you get that Meta number from? Meta's revenue for the
| last quarter was 48.38B, and net income is 20.84B (and it was
| less in previous quarters). Tesla revenue was 25.71B. Revenue
| is better in comparing how "big" a company is, but it's kinda
| apples to oranges comparison when one company is making
| physical products, while the other operates websites and other
| services (Tesla has nearly two times more employees, for
| example). For Toyota I see $12.5B net income and $152.2B
| revenue for Q3 2024 (dwarfing Tesla). I agree that Tesla
| valuation is completely disconnected from its revenue and
| income.
|
| EDIT: I guess that your Meta income number is yearly and it
| checks out. The article says that Tesla "reported $2.3 billion
| in income" but I think they got that number for the last
| quarter, because even in the SEC document linked in the
| article[0], page 49, I see $7B net income, the same number as
| in their earnings release[1]. But the SEC document also lists
| $1.8B taxes for the year 2024, so that seems to contradict the
| headline of the article, but they're talking only about US
| federal taxes, I guess most of these taxes is non-US or state.
|
| EDIT2: Yes, on page 81 it's listed that they paid 0 federal
| taxes, $45M state taxes, and $1.3B foreign taxes. $2.3B in
| income for whole 2024 is US only, $7B is global.
|
| [0]
| https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1318605/000162828025...
|
| [1] https://digitalassets.tesla.com/tesla-
| contents/image/upload/...
| whatever1 wrote:
| Only the W2 losers are paying taxes.
___________________________________________________________________
(page generated 2025-02-01 08:02 UTC)