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America's Biggest Companies Paid Top Execs More Than They Paid In Taxes
(www.huffpost.com)
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this post was submitted on 13 Mar 2024
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United States | News & Politics
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Imagine a world where combined C-suite salaries were capped at the tax burden a company owes past a certain point. I think that would be incredibly funny to see the conflict of interest at play. Want your accounting/legal department to research tax loopholes to exploit? Sure thing, but it's coming straight out of your paycheck!
Oh, you "had a bad year"? Probably shouldn't be taking home a hundred million dollars then.
Combined with a "top pay can't make more than x times the salary of the lowest paid employee" with the exception being the tax thing, I could see it being a great double bind into making companies either pay their workers more or actually pay their share in taxes.
I know it would basically never happen in the US but a girl can dream
That is a fantastic idea and could be its own sitcom. My guess is that they would figure out how to "pay" them in different ways through corporations that don't exist, island accounts, etc.
I'm picturing a CEO in a board meeting suddenly turning heel on the fiscal policy and spinning it as "y'know it really is our duty as a fortune 500 American company to be paying our taxes because it pays dividends back into this country..." met by the credulous looks from everyone else in the room and mix of eager to pensive nods from other Executives.
The C-suite trying to pull fast ones by Accounting hoping they won't notice but getting their plots subtly foiled by the existence of so many tax loopholes.
The only thing across the runtime that definitely 100% for sure won't happen is the blanket lowest-pay raises, but it frequently gets brought up as a joke that's only funny for the first few episodes and quickly becomes a tired cliche; the last resort suggestion that has to be tried and shot down every. single. time even though it becomes increasingly clear that it would be a net positive for everyone. In that sense, the humor is still there, but it's in the cynical acknowledgement of the situation rather than the lowest paid employee actually being the butt of the joke.
Usually it's through stock. Capital gains taxes are low.
There are people on here that say that most of their salaries are only from stock, so it's not that big of deal. For example, Spez's salary. I've been duped again, it's better for it to be stock, lol.