Making the "avoidance" even more notable, is that Washington State is currently in the midst of a $430 million USD budget deficit, one that would be turned to a surplus if Microsoft was paying their taxes.
Says Reifman: "Over the past thirteen years, I estimate that Microsoft has avoided paying more than $707 million in B & O taxes on sales of its corporate software licenses. Although the majority of its software development is performed in Washington State, Microsoft records its estimated $18 billion in licensing revenue per year through a corporate office in Reno, Nevada where there is no licensing tax."
He continues: "Under the state's .484 percent software royalty tax(lowered from 1.5 percent in 1998 after industry lobbying), I estimate that Microsoft should have paid more than $90 million in 2008 and $87 million in 2009 in state taxes."
Reifman concludes: "Just by enforcing the state's existing tax law from 2008 onwards, we could reduce Washington's revenue shortfall by more than 70 percent. Alternately, we could pursue the entire $707 million from Microsoft's thirteen years of tax dodging and cover most of the expected deficit going forward - perhaps more if damages are awarded through litigation.
Since Microsoft began operations in Reno in 1997, it has enjoyed record-setting revenue of more than $446 billion and profit of more than $124 billion. If it paid its actual tax bill in full today, it would still have more than $24 billion in cash holdings."
We will keep you updated.
Written by: Andre Yoskowitz @ 26 Sep 2009 13:48
