Effective Tax Rates of U.S. Corporations

Perhaps the most interesting aspect of this chart is the animated way in which it changes shape when you click the "Show Industries" button. As technology and human capability increases over time, our expectations increase for more sophisticated and entertaining presentations be they business reports or movie scenes. This Javascript-enabled chart plots U.S. corporation effective tax rates. Those to the left of the mean line paid the least. Circle size indicates total earnings. So, a big circle to the left indicates big revenue and low taxes paid. Apple is one of the largest circles with $135B earnings and a 14% tax rate. Amazon, at $5.5B, paid 6%. Google paid 17% on $56B. Warren Buffet's company paid 23% on $96B. On the other side of the line lies Exxon Mobile at 37% on $395B earnings. Pharma giant Pfizer paid 43% on $63B, Chevron paid 39% on $220B. As a group, Utilities and IT companies paid the least while energy and insurance paid the most. In the light of the current IRS scandal, an interesting dimension to add to the chart would be donations by corporate chieftains to political parties. BTW, my effective tax rate for 2012 was 37% (Fed alone was 26%).

Posted May 2013

Johanson Technology Hi-Q Porcelain Capacitors - RF Cafe Website

RF Cafe began life in 1996 as "RF Tools" in an AOL screen name web space totaling 2 MB. Its primary purpose was to provide me with ready access to commonly needed formulas and reference material while performing my work as an RF system and circuit design engineer. The World Wide Web (Internet) was largely an unknown entity at the time and bandwidth was a scarce commodity. Dial-up modems blazed along at 14.4 kbps while tying up your telephone line, and a lady's voice announced "You've Got Mail" when a new message arrived...