Business & Politics News and Discussions

[Georgesnire]

Can a society truly achieve equality and justice if artificial intelligence is used to govern and make decisions, or does it risk perpetuating biases and discrimination in new and unforeseen ways?

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America's Largest Companies Dodged Nearly $300 Billion In Taxes, Report Finds

Source: Huff Post

Feb 29, 2024, 06:00 AM EST

The country’s largest companies dodged more than $276 billion in federal corporate income taxes from 2018 to 2022, a new report from the nonprofit Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy finds.

The report examined corporate income taxes paid by 342 of the country’s largest companies from 2018 to 2022, the latest year for which companies have reported their earnings. All of them were profitable in all five years covered by the report.

Yet the vast majority used loopholes and special tax breaks to pay an effective federal income tax rate well below 21%, the rate they were required to pay on paper. And 109 — or nearly one out of every three — found a way to pay zero federal income taxes in at least one year out of the five. Those same 109 corporations scored $14.34 billion in federal tax rebates over the five year period.

The findings underscore that the 21% corporate tax rate is “a fiction,” said Matt Gardner, the lead author and an ITEP senior fellow — particularly for huge multinationals.

Read more: https://www.huffpost.com/entry/corporat ... 346d54dff2

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Here's the New Republic article being featured in the post:

https://newrepublic.com/post/173668/rep ... 4-priority

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[Time_Traveller]

Marlboro firm sells $2.2bn stake in Bud Light owner

3 hours ago

The maker of Marlboro cigarettes, Altria Group, says it will sell more than $2.2bn (£1.7bn) of shares in AB InBev, the owner of the Bud Light and Stella Artois beer brands.

The move will see Altria offloading 35 million AB InBev shares.

The tobacco giant currently owns a stake of around 10% in the world's biggest brewer, worth about $12.7bn.

Bud Light sales have been hit after a US boycott over its work with transgender influencer Dylan Mulvaney.

The sale is "an opportunistic transaction that realises a portion of the substantial return on our long-term investment," Altria's chief executive, Billy Gifford, said in a statement.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-68561614

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https://www.msn.com/en-ca/news/world/re ... r-BB1kn5kw

More on that by the AP:

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https://www.cnn.com/2024/03/24/politics ... index.html

Here's something better:

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[Time_Traveller]

Secondhand clothing on track to take 10% of global fashion sales

Wed 27 Mar 2024 10.00 GMT



Secondhand clothing sales are on track to make up a tenth of the global fashion market next year, as the cost of living crisis and concerns over sustainability drives consumers towards “pre-loved” garments.

Global sales of pre-owned clothes surged by 18% last year to $197bn (£156bn) and are forecast to reach $350bn in 2028, according to a report by GlobalData for resale specialist ThredUp. The landmark is expected to be reached a year later than predicted, as global growth remains slightly behind previous estimates.

However, the US secondhand market grew seven times faster than overall fashion retail where sales were flat in 2023 from a year earlier.

James Reinhart, the co-founder and chief executive of ThredUp, said the resale sector had continued to grow in a tough market because it was “more resilient” when household budgets were squeezed by higher energy and food bills.

“When consumer sentiment is softer, value is key,” he said. “People are looking to shop secondhand to drive more value.”

https://www.theguardian.com/business/20 ... hion-sales

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Walmart to shut all health clinics in US over lack of profitability

Source: Reuters

April 30, 2024 1:57 PM EDT Updated 4 hours ago

April 30 (Reuters) - Walmart (WMT.N) said on Tuesday it will close all 51 of its health clinics and shut its virtual health care operations, saying it could not see it as a sustainable business model to continue.

"Healthcare is expensive to run. We were finding that the increased labor and operating costs environment, like with reimbursement, both public and private, made it difficult (to run the business) and obvious we had to close," Walmart spokeswoman Marilee McInnis told Reuters. The company said in a statement those challenges created an environment where it saw a "lack of profitability" that made the care business "unsustainable for us at this time."

Companies such as Walmart, Walgreens, Amazon and CVS have expanded into providing healthcare services during the past five years, seeing opportunities in the highly fragmented U.S. system. But it has not been clear that consumers want such services from retailers or that they are profitable. Walgreens, for instance, is planning to close 160 of its VillageMD primary care clinics after it recorded a $5.8 billion impairment charge on its investment in VillageMD.

Amazon in February said it would cut a few hundred jobs across its healthcare units, including clinic operator One Medical which it acquired for $3.5 billion last year. And Walmart's sudden decision to close all its 51 health clinics and telehealth operations marks a startling about-face from its plan last year to nearly double the number of these health centers across the U.S. by 2024.

Read more: https://www.reuters.com/business/health ... 024-04-30/

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IRS plans to increase audit rates of wealthy taxpayers by 50%

Source: CNN Politics

Published 1:42 PM EDT, Thu May 2, 2024

Washington CNN — The Internal Revenue Service detailed its plans Thursday to significantly ramp up audit rates of wealthy taxpayers and large corporations, using funds provided by the Democrat-backed Inflation Reduction Act that passed in 2022.

The audit rate of taxpayers earning more than $10 million is expected to increase by 50%, going up from 11% in 2019 to 16.5% in 2026. The IRS also plans to triple the audit rates of large corporations with assets over $250 million, as well as increase the audit rates of business partnerships with assets over $10 million by tenfold over the seven-year period.

Despite the expected increases, audit rates won’t exceed those reached in 2010 because the number of filings by large corporations, partnerships and wealthy individuals have grown and become more complex, the IRS said.

The IRS is using the influx of money provided by the Inflation Reduction Act to modernize the agency, improve services for taxpayers and collect more tax revenue from those who have not been paying what they owe. But Republicans, concerned that small businesses and the middle class could be targeted by IRS auditors, have made several efforts to chip away at the agency’s funding.

Read more: https://www.cnn.com/2024/05/02/politics ... index.html

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Corporate Profiteering Schemes That Drive Inflation Detailed at Senate Hearing
by Brett Wilkins
May 2, 2024

Introduction:

(Common Dreams) Progressive policy experts took aim at corporate greed and profiteering during a Thursday U.S. Senate hearing on "shrinkflation," the process of reducing the size or quantity of a product while selling it at the same price.

At the Senate Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs hearing—entitled "Higher Prices: How Shrinkflation and Technology Can Impact Consumers' Finances"—Chair Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio) began by acknowledging that "prices today are far too high, and families are having a harder time finding a fair price, seeing more of their paycheck vanish into thin air."

"All of this is happening while corporate profits hit record highs," the senator continued. "Let's be clear: The fact that prices and corporate profits are going up at the same time is no coincidence. A study by the Kansas City Fed found that corporate profits drove half of the price increases in 2021."

(See linked article for Twitter Feed)

Bilal Baydoun, director of policy and research at the Groundwork Collaborative, testified that "in America today, a fair price, let alone a sweet deal, is harder and harder to come by. In the age of corporate concentration and high-powered algorithms, pricing is in the midst of a troubling transformation, and the price tag as we know it may become a relic of the past."

"At every turn, companies are cutting corners on the path to record profits, and American consumers are paying the price," he continued. "In a practice known as 'shrinkflation,' companies discreetly reduce the size or volume of common household items—everything from jars of peanut butter to bars of soap—to charge consumers more for less."

Read more here: https://www.commondreams.org/news/sena ... n-hearing

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ABC News President Kim Godwin Is Stepping Down

Source: Wall Street Journal (gift link)

ABC News President Kim Godwin stepped down Sunday night, months after a corporate restructuring that effectively stripped away much of her management autonomy.

“I have decided to retire from broadcast journalism,” Godwin said in the email sent to staff Sunday night. “Anyone who’s passionate about what we do knows there’s no other business like it, so this was not an easy or quick decision. But after considerable reflection, I’m certain it’s the right one for me as I look to the future and prioritize what’s most important for me and my family.”

No successor has been named for Godwin, who was named president of the division in 2021.

Godwin’s retirement comes after a restructuring in February that gave her a new boss in Debra OConnell, who serves as president of parent Disney’s pointing triangle news group. OConnell is a company veteran who is familiar with ABC News, having scrutinized operations across Disney’s networks as part of a corporate review.

Read more: https://www.wsj.com/business/media/abc- ... _permalink

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Political Elites Take Advantage of Anti-partisan Protests to Disrupt Politics
May 24, 2024

Introduction:

(Eurekalert) Protest movements that reject political parties have an unintended consequence, according to new research from the University of Notre Dame: They empower savvy politicians who channel them to shake up the status quo.

Conclusion:

“Sometimes you need social movements to challenge entrenched systems and respond to the needs and aspirations of the people,” Mische said, adding that further research could help explore the dynamics of insider-outsider coalitions for enacting reforms.

“But if you reject working with the state, then you cannot influence the development of policies that are important for the things that you care about. You may, instead, empower autocrats who don’t share your values but are adept at weaponizing institutional distrust. Understanding this dynamic is important to working for change and to strengthening global democracy at a time when institutions are increasingly under attack.”

Read more here: https://www.eurekalert.org/news-releases/1045994

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