Meta Uses A.I. Data Centers to Avoid Billions in Federal Taxes
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Meta Uses A.I. Data Centers to Avoid Billions in Federal Taxes
Unofficial Hacker News client; not affiliated with Y Combinator.
djoldman · · focus · HN ↗
Previously we've seen "The Secret IRS Files" from Propublica as well as other coverage of tax avoidance that never resulted in tax evasion charges. Coverage wide enough that it's arguably safe to assume that no laws were broken because there was quite the demand for an enforcement response.
The funny thing is that a more accurate title for these pieces would be, "Federal Government Allows [tax-paying entity] a Massive Tax Break." And then the piece would be all about how the senate, congress, and president either explicitly wanted there to be this extreme tax loophole or was incompetent and allowed something they didn't mean to allow.
Folks are continually getting upset and riled up about players in the economic system instead of who and what makes the rules.
An analogous example: everyone got cranky about Martin Shkreli, mostly because he raised prices on Deraprim, although also because many would label him a brash jerk. But he went to jail for finance stuff, not raising prices. Why? Because raising prices in the way he did wasn't something the feds thought was illegal or wasn't something they thought he could be convicted of.
Folks get mad at Musk, Zuckerberg, etc... if they're doing something illegal, ok yea that makes sense. If folks are mad about actions that are legal, it makes zero sense to be mad at the actor. Be mad at the people/entities who created the legal loopholes and laws.
lenerdenator · · focus · HN ↗
Musk volunteered to illegally fire a bunch of federal employees on the grounds that gosh darn it, the deficit's too damned high, we need to get these troglodyte federal employees off the payroll and whip this place into shape and run it like a for-profit business because those are never ever inefficient.
If he's going to leave a bunch of people without a paycheck and health insurance through arbitrary firings because we're too deep in debt as a country, then he can also recognize that there's never been a business that has turned around a deficit without increasing revenues.
Zuck's not a part of the firings but seems to at least humor such downsizing efforts while existing in the MAGA orbit.
Trump himself may very well have committed tax evasion when he claimed a write-off for a casino that he had an interest in while also taking a benefit from the process.
They all do it with the same excuse: money in private hands is better at creating economic growth than money in government hands. There's a point at which this is no longer true, especially when you take into account government debt.
If people just paid their g*ddamned taxes we're in a much shallower fiscal hole as a country than we are now. We're talking hundreds of billions in revenue each year [0]
[0] <a href="https://bipartisanpolicy.org/explainer/the-tax-gap-what-it-is-and-how-it-affects-federal-revenue/" rel="nofollow">https://bipartisanpolicy.org/explainer/the-tax-gap-what-it-i...