The Republican Party just passed and is celebrating the GOP Tax Scam, with the obsequious genuflecting to Trump added even more insult to the injury that they have done to the nation. Amid the Tax Scam, the Republican Senators and Representatives tried to stuff in measures every which way to Sunday to gouge wage-earning Americans to put money into special interests and billionaire contributors. Within this were numerous deals providing special deals to fossil fuel interests.
When it comes to benefiting from tax cuts, those dirty industries needed special deals because they pretty much don’t pay any taxes relative to their incomes as is seen strikingly in this table from 538.
- Coal firms essentially don’t pay Federal taxes.
- Oil firms are under ten percent effective tax rate.
Well look who’s all the way down there at the bottom…
Coal, oil, and gas. #GOPTaxScam #BigOilBailOut https://t.co/Ool4D2W7Fr
— Sunrise Movement (@sunrisemvmt) December 17, 2017
The average tax rate paid by money-making, publicly traded companies at the start of the year was about 26%. https://t.co/8uA6AI8Tae pic.twitter.com/6imfMnoaSo
— FiveThirtyEight (@FiveThirtyEight) December 15, 2017
Pretty hard to take seriously fossil fools whining about oppressive taxation when, essentially, they aren’t paying taxes.
This is made explicit after the fold. Even looking solely at money-making companies, fossil fools don’t look so foolish when it comes to avoiding taxes. With years of sneaking in this benefit and that exclusion, coal and oil firms pay a fraction of the taxes of other industries.
- Aerospace/defense: 23%
- Auto parts: 27%
- Construction supplies: 30%
- Food wholesalers: 34%
- Machinery: 27%
- etc …
The average, across all industries, is an effective tax rate of 26.22% for money-making companies.
What about fossil fuels?
- Coal: 0.69%
- Oil/Gas:
- integrated: 8.01%
- production/exploration: 7.08%
- Distribution: 7.78%
No wonder they aren’t focused on tax cuts and are pleading for even more subsidies, special deals, and enabling more polluting. After all, how can you cut taxes when they barely pay them?
To show the absurdity, let’s stay sort of in the same extraction world,
- Metals & mining: 33.52%
How about other traditional energy:
- utilities: 30.09%
How about dirty energy’s clean competition?
- Green & renewable energy: 26.42%
While clean energy firms, pretty much, are paying ‘what business pays’ in taxes, the dirty energy firms polluting the air our children breathe, the water they drink, and the future they will live in are barely paying any taxes at all. When you hear of fossil foolish subsidies, this fossil-foolishly low effective tax rate is a cogent example of their reality.
Now, even with their absurdly low tax rates, the OIl Giants win giantly (YUGELY) from the GOP tax scheme, perhaps even boosting earnings per share by five percent. There are gains from expensing (allowing, for five years, 100 percent deducted in year one rather than deduction schedules), reduced US implications of overseas earnings, etc, etc, etc … For decades, the legions of lawyers, accountants, and lobbyists have worked hard to assure that the oil, natural gas, and coal industries pay as low an effective tax rate as possible. With their claws in the Republican Party, they successfully snuck plenty of fossil-foolish provisions that will even further lower their contribution to the general treasury.
Tax Rates by Industry
Data as of January 2017
| Industry name | Number of firms | Average across all companies | Average across only money-making companies | Aggregate effective tax rate |
| Advertising | 41 | 5.10% | 30.93% | 32.68% |
| Aerospace/Defense | 96 | 10.86% | 23.22% | 25.09% |
| Air Transport | 18 | 22.99% | 28.52% | 21.14% |
| Apparel | 58 | 10.95% | 22.42% | 21.80% |
| Auto & Truck | 15 | 8.14% | 12.66% | 9.10% |
| Auto Parts | 63 | 10.40% | 27.22% | 25.41% |
| Bank (Money Center) | 10 | 27.90% | 30.23% | 30.23% |
| Banks (Regional) | 645 | 25.43% | 29.94% | 29.20% |
| Beverage (Alcoholic) | 25 | 10.86% | 26.91% | 27.04% |
| Beverage (Soft) | 36 | 5.87% | 23.50% | 23.52% |
| Broadcasting | 30 | 18.54% | 29.32% | 37.82% |
| Brokerage & Investment Banking | 45 | 13.59% | 30.63% | 30.71% |
| Building Materials | 41 | 23.39% | 30.05% | 12.53% |
| Business & Consumer Services | 165 | 12.61% | 35.45% | 38.64% |
| Cable TV | 14 | 20.28% | 37.20% | 20.65% |
| Chemical (Basic) | 45 | 7.71% | 23.77% | 29.20% |
| Chemical (Diversified) | 8 | 6.59% | 11.56% | 11.33% |
| Chemical (Specialty) | 100 | 9.58% | 27.57% | 30.42% |
| Coal & Related Energy | 38 | 0.48% | 0.69% | NA |
| Computer Services | 117 | 11.18% | 15.63% | 15.99% |
| Computers/Peripherals | 55 | 5.68% | 25.59% | 26.44% |
| Construction Supplies | 51 | 18.44% | 30.41% | 26.46% |
| Diversified | 24 | 11.55% | 22.37% | 22.97% |
| Drugs (Biotechnology) | 426 | 1.44% | 19.99% | 31.79% |
| Drugs (Pharmaceutical) | 164 | 2.54% | 18.18% | 19.41% |
| Education | 36 | 9.29% | 33.79% | 40.72% |
| Electrical Equipment | 119 | 5.87% | 28.74% | 34.02% |
| Electronics (Consumer & Office) | 24 | 3.81% | 30.25% | NA |
| Electronics (General) | 164 | 8.85% | 22.36% | 9.71% |
| Engineering/Construction | 48 | 15.15% | 33.90% | 49.85% |
| Entertainment | 79 | 5.50% | 30.64% | 30.34% |
| Environmental & Waste Services | 89 | 5.07% | 35.55% | 36.03% |
| Farming/Agriculture | 37 | 7.89% | 23.82% | 24.68% |
| Financial Svcs. (Non-bank & Insurance) | 258 | 20.80% | 31.81% | 31.90% |
| Food Processing | 87 | 14.66% | 30.10% | 29.48% |
| Food Wholesalers | 16 | 11.77% | 34.17% | 29.77% |
| Furn/Home Furnishings | 30 | 14.58% | 23.72% | 23.81% |
| Green & Renewable Energy | 25 | 4.25% | 26.42% | NA |
| Healthcare Products | 254 | 6.12% | 16.51% | 16.35% |
| Healthcare Support Services | 121 | 14.31% | 38.15% | 38.27% |
| Heathcare Information and Technology | 125 | 6.32% | 17.53% | 19.08% |
| Homebuilding | 33 | 27.28% | 34.37% | 34.39% |
| Hospitals/Healthcare Facilities | 38 | 12.06% | 31.40% | 54.47% |
| Hotel/Gaming | 69 | 11.23% | 12.10% | 15.99% |
| Household Products | 129 | 9.05% | 26.65% | 27.06% |
| Information Services | 64 | 16.37% | 27.15% | 28.51% |
| Insurance (General) | 19 | 18.33% | 24.92% | 23.20% |
| Insurance (Life) | 22 | 22.91% | 25.47% | 25.48% |
| Insurance (Prop/Cas.) | 50 | 22.27% | 27.32% | 27.39% |
| Investments & Asset Management | 156 | 7.71% | 23.02% | 24.41% |
| Machinery | 127 | 11.73% | 27.05% | 28.76% |
| Metals & Mining | 97 | 1.16% | 33.52% | NA |
| Office Equipment & Services | 24 | 16.68% | 31.30% | 30.80% |
| Oil/Gas (Integrated) | 7 | 1.14% | 8.01% | NA |
| Oil/Gas (Production and Exploration) | 330 | 0.32% | 7.08% | NA |
| Oil/Gas Distribution | 78 | 2.93% | 7.78% | 3.44% |
| Oilfield Svcs/Equip. | 148 | 4.11% | 28.22% | NA |
| Packaging & Container | 26 | 24.47% | 27.68% | 24.70% |
| Paper/Forest Products | 23 | 14.46% | 12.58% | 6.48% |
| Power | 68 | 19.27% | 29.22% | 43.67% |
| Precious Metals | 109 | 1.84% | 90.15% | NA |
| Publishing & Newspapers | 37 | 14.32% | 35.32% | 34.67% |
| R.E.I.T. | 238 | 1.72% | 2.16% | NA |
| Real Estate (Development) | 18 | 1.97% | 28.58% | NA |
| Real Estate (General/Diversified) | 11 | 15.32% | 22.36% | 8.49% |
| Real Estate (Operations & Services) |