OMG
Any decrease in tax paid by a firm is offset by increases paid by others. In other words, tax breaks are merely money that comes out of your pocket and goes into the firm's.
If you still don't get it, consider this. Suppose you and your neighbor are both single and made $50K last year, and your tax rate was 15%. Then both of you would pay $7500 in taxes this year and be left with $42,500 after-tax income. But then let's say Uncle Sam gave your neighbor a
subsidy check for $3000, but nothing to you. Then your neighbor would be left with $45,500 while you would still have the $42,500.
Now what if Uncle Sam instead
did not give your neighbor any subsidies, but instead just gave him a 6%
tax break, making his tax only 9%, while yours is left at 15%. Now your neighbor would pay only $4500 in taxes, while you'd still pay the $7500, meaning he's be left with $45,500 after-tax income, while you'd be left w/$42,500.
. . .just like what happened when he got the subsidy.
Slight issues with your post however with what I'm talking about.
First, while the net effect is the same...my neighbor ends up with $45.5k...the time period said money comes is different. A tax break provides for that extra $3,000 dollars to come spread over a 12 month period of time where as the $3,000 subsidy is a lump sum.
Second, in the case of the tax break that is money never going into the Federal Governments hands. Meaning its not hitting their budget and is not money that they can claim as theirs. In the case of the subsidy, you're simply adding an extra layer of useless beuracracy to the process as you give money to the government so that they can turn around and give it back to you. Allowing them to claim a higher revenue and a higher expenditure level, which in the government is what is used to justify increasing the amount your agency should get to spend the following year.
So yes, while you could say that Point A and Point B in this situation are the same thing (that my neighbor ends up with 45.5k...the method with which Point B is met and the path of travel is significantly different and thus comparing the two things as if they're identical is a bit in error.
Similar? Absolutely, but I'd never suggest they weren't similar in nature.
Subsidies encourage the government to tax people more to be able to give out more money and all together continue the process of government spending and government taxing increasing again and again. Government tax cuts encourage the government to spend less, as they are taking in less money and thus have less money they can send back out. I'm in favor of things that cause the government to shrink its waist size, not things that allow it to continue to be bloated simply to stick it to the evil rich Oil Companies.
I will say, as I have said multiple times on this forum. I will get behind tax increases in certain areas, including on the oil industry, once...and only once...the government shows a sincere and honest movement towards significant reduction in spending across the board and with reforming our entitlement programs. At that point, when they show us they've fix their OWN problems, then I'd be willing to say that the public should then step in and help to pay down the debt by potentially taking a higher tax burden on those that can handle it for a period of time. But I can not, and will not, support such a notion while our government continues to present an inability to control its gluttonous ways as they have shown, time and time and time again, that when they recieve new streams of income it is not used to pay for what we have now but is justification to expand and add new things to the budget only to turn around later and say "give us more".
If that means some military bases close down, some children go hungry, some elderly get sick, some poor people don't have a roof, some kids don't go to college, some junky doesn't get clean, some drop out doesn't get a job, some guy with bad luck can't pay his mortgage, some farmers don't get extra cash for growing corn, some labs can't research bear semen, or some museum has to shut down in exchange for moving our country to a place of financial stability for the next generation and beyond? Than absolutely so be it. Because I think the notion that we can continue everything we're doing, and even add to it, all by simply taxing heavier and heavier a small segment of our population and still somehow come out financial stable 40 years from now is similar to suggesting that we should find a leprechaun and stela his gold to make us financially stable.