Amazon to Joe Biden: We pay all our taxes



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"I have nothing against Amazon, but no company making billions of dollars in profit should pay a lower tax rate than firefighters and teachers.We must reward work, not just wealth. ", tweeted the former vice president, connecting to a New York April story, which tells how Amazon got a discount on its corporate taxes in 2018.

In the early evening, Amazon replied:

"We have been paying $ 2.6 billion in corporate taxes since 2016. We pay every penny we owe. The tax laws designed by Congress encourage businesses to reinvest in the US economy. We have 200 billion investments since 2011 and 300,000 American jobs. Biden's complaint is w / the tax code, not Amazon. "

According to the Institute of Taxation and Economic Policy left, Amazon has obtained a $ 129 million refund on its profits of $ 11.2 billion in 2018 due to various tax credits. On the basis of state taxes, the last time the company paid federal taxes was in 2016, according to the group's analysis regarding regulatory filings.
Amazon is far from the only one not to have to pay federal tax. Companies ranging from Delta Airlines to Duke Energy also benefited from rebates in 2018, a list that was lengthened due to the redesign of the 2017 tax, which reduced the corporate tax rate from 35% to 21%. %. The debate on corporate taxation broke out on the public scene in 2013, when legislators convened Apple for a hearing on its network of tax havens. Like Amazon, Apple argued that Congress set the rules and that it simply found a way to pay the least tax possible in this context.
But Amazon has also waged unusual public struggles to reduce taxes owed, such as a new big employer tax passed by Seattle last year, but only to repeal it after a campaign of Aggressive opposition led by Amazon and other employers. The company also mobilized cities and states to obtain tax breaks when looking for a second seat, and avoided paying sales taxes for years until its growing network of physical warehouses prompted it. to turn around and collect them everywhere.

Biden was not as outspoken in his criticism of corporations as other contenders for the Democratic Party, notably Sens. Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders, but was forced to change direction on many issues to follow a changing electorate.

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