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Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway Owes Taxes Going Back To 2002 [edited]

Lord Tammerlain said:
America the land of the lack of free speach for those you dissagree with

Brings a tear to the eye
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He needs to shut up to save whatever face he has left because he's a discredited piece of ****, not because I say so.
 
MaggieD said:
Anyone who can't see the irony of Warren Buffett sounding off about how the rich should be paying more taxes while his own company, the second largest corporation on planet earth, owes the Internal Revenue Service $1 billion in back taxes, simply isn't being honest.

World's third wealthiest person in the world; the majority stockholder in the company in question (worth $105 billion); has another little side business worth $79.7 billion (Berkshire Hathaway Junior); is personally worth $47 billion today; ...and his company has wrangled with the IRS for years to avoid paying $1 billion in taxes. And he's still not paid it.

If he were like the rest of us, he would have had to pony up immediately and wrangled later.

He should go to NYC and surrender to Occupy Wall Street.
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Where do you get the "$1billion"? I've been looking and there are not much information about what's owned and the details of the dispute with the IRS.
 
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LaMidRighter said:
He needs to shut up to save whatever face he has left because he's a discredited piece of ****, not because I say so.
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That of course is your poorly informed decision, not reality
 
LaMidRighter said:
I get that, what my point is getting to is that he doesn't put into action what he advocates which he could do immediately. He advocates what he won't do while he sees fit to volunteer other people in his bracket who may or may not agree, it is insulting that he says one thing while doing the other.
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He is not advocating that business should not take advantage of the laws as written.
 
LaMidRighter said:
Geez. Then he needs to settle his companies tax bill, pay up, and then shut up.
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The bill is being disputed. Do you know if Buffet can pay out when the company is disputing the amount owned to the Treasury? If Buffet uses his position as CEO to pay out money that is contrary to shareholders' best interest, then he's breaking his fiduciary duty.


And why should he shut up? Being a CEO doesn't mean he should not have an opinion and social conscience.
 
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nonpareil said:
Where do you get "$1billion"? I've been looking and there are not much information about what's owned and the details of the dispute with the IRS.
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According to the rules of this forum the headline should not be allowed.
 
Aunt Spiker said:
You know - in mah town. We close down businesses who don't pay up.

Mmm hmm. Just sayin.

And we puts a sign on their doorsthat says "closed due to non payment of taxes" - nice bigole letters sos yous can see.
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Well that is only if the entity owing the taxes does not dispute what is owed and takes it to court.

Generally those business that you mention dont have money to pay taxes or the laywers to dispute the taxes and would have been shut down anyway
 
Lord Tammerlain said:
That of course is your poorly informed decision, not reality
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Then do explain how a tax cheat, lying, hypocrite is not discredited AFTER IT'S FOUND HIS BUSINESS OWES ONE BILLION DOLLARS! let me put that into long form for you. He doesn't owe 1$, he doesn't owe10, 100, 1000, etc.
He owes approximately 1,000,000,000 U.S.D.

There is no spin in the world that makes my "decision" "poorly informed". The reality is we have a tax cheating hypocrite that says what one side wants to hear and they are falling on their swords to protect him.
 
nonpareil said:
The bill is being disputed. Do you know if Buffet can pay out when the company is disputing the amount owned to the Treasury? If Buffet uses his position as CEO to pay out money that is contrary to shareholders' best interest, then he's breaking his fiduciary duty.


And why should he shut up? Being a CEO doesn't mean he should not have an opinion and social conscience.
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I know all of that, the fact is when he spouts off stupid **** about not owing enough money he violates that duty by putting their returns at risk if someone takes him seriously. That is the point, the guy is a loud mouthed hypocrite.
 
LaMidRighter said:
Then do explain how a tax cheat, lying, hypocrite is not discredited AFTER IT'S FOUND HIS BUSINESS OWES ONE BILLION DOLLARS! let me put that into long form for you. He doesn't owe 1$, he doesn't owe10, 100, 1000, etc.
He owes approximately 1,000,000,000 U.S.D.
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Link please, because the OP doesn't that.
 
winston53660 said:
Link please, because the OP doesn't that.
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I'm tying in all issues related Buffett. There won't be a link with what I'm saying. But let's just think about it, if he says he's paying less than his secretary he's lying because he's in a higher bracket or at least should/could be. He's a hypocrite because he does all of the creative tax dodging he rails against, and the simple dispute with the IRS says he owes the money, when it comes to the IRS you have to prove you don't owe it, they don't have the burden of proof sad to say.
 
Lord Tammerlain said:
They were not and are not his taxes to be paid, they are BH taxes which is in dispute with the government on whether or not they are actually owed or not
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He owes the taxes. That is no longer in dispute. It is included in their latest financial statements. As the major stockholder, Chairman of the Board, and Chief Executive Officer, he has the authority....no, the responsibility to see that the corporation pays its taxes. He chose not to do so. He chose to use the system against itself and protest. Further, instead of paying the tax bill and then protesting, which is the way the rest of us have to do it, he chose not to pay at all. Rather, his company, yes his company, has been in a protracted legal battle for years attempting to avoid these taxes. And this is the not the first time. Last was a 14-year legal battle that ended in 2005.
 
LaMidRighter said:
I know all of that, the fact is when he spouts off stupid **** about not owing enough money he violates that duty by putting their returns at risk if someone takes him seriously. That is the point, the guy is a loud mouthed hypocrite.
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How would their return be at risk when someone takes what he says seriously?

You have not shown that he's a hypocrite. The company that he's a CEO of is disputing their tax liability with the IRS. It doesn't say that the company is doing anything illegal to avoid taxes. It doesn't say that Buffet is doing anything illegal to avoid taxes. It doesn't invalidate his arguement that the capital gain tax results in him paying a lower rate on his income than his secretary.
 
nonpareil said:
Right. So there's no data to back the claim that it's $1billion?
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According to page 56 of the company report, “At December 31, 2010… net unrecognized tax benefits were $1,005 million”, or about $1 billion. McCarty explained, “Unrecognized tax benefits represent the company’s potential future obligation to the IRS and other taxing authorities. They have to be recorded in the company’s financial statements.”
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Update: Warren Buffett’s Company Owes Nearly $1 Billion in Taxes | TheBlaze.com
 
MaggieD said:
He owes the taxes. That is no longer in dispute. It is included in their latest financial statements. As the major stockholder, Chairman of the Board, and Chief Executive Officer, he has the authority....no, the responsibility to see that the corporation pays its taxes. He chose not to do so. He chose to use the system against itself and protest. Further, instead of paying the tax bill and then protesting, which is the way the rest of us have to do it, he chose not to pay at all. Rather, his company, yes his company, has been in a protracted legal battle for years attempting to avoid these taxes. And this is the not the first time. Last was a 14-year legal battle that ended in 2005.
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It's undisputedly false. He doesn't own the tax, or at least that's not what the OP claims. Berkshire Hathaway does own something to the IRS and they are disputing the amount.
 
nonpareil said:
How would their return be at risk when someone takes what he says seriously?

You have not shown that he's a hypocrite. The company that he's a CEO of is disputing their tax liability with the IRS. It doesn't say that the company is doing anything illegal to avoid taxes. It doesn't say that Buffet is doing anything illegal to avoid taxes. It doesn't invalidate his arguement that the capital gain tax results in him paying a lower rate on his income than his secretary.
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Economics lesson for you, when his company gets the **** taxed out of it the company will have less money, less money means less to divide up to investors. That's fine in Buffett's case because that piece of trash deserves to reap what he sows personally and anyone who can entertain that piece of **** also deserves the loss. Now, Buffett goes grand scale and says everyone in his bracket should pay more in taxes, those taxes come from profits which means the companies have less, less is the opposite of more which means that the people who have money in other companies will suffer from a smaller pie(less money in their coffers more in the government's remember). Since less will never be more than more and Buffett is an advocate of less, he fails in his fiduciary duty.

Now, legal or not, which is NOT what anyone has said, Buffett has come out for MORE taxes while he and his company try to pay LESS. If you can't see a problem I can't help you.
 
MaggieD said:
He owes the taxes. That is no longer in dispute. It is included in their latest financial statements. As the major stockholder, Chairman of the Board, and Chief Executive Officer, he has the authority....no, the responsibility to see that the corporation pays its taxes. He chose not to do so. He chose to use the system against itself and protest. Further, instead of paying the tax bill and then protesting, which is the way the rest of us have to do it, he chose not to pay at all. Rather, his company, yes his company, has been in a protracted legal battle for years attempting to avoid these taxes. And this is the not the first time. Last was a 14-year legal battle that ended in 2005.
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Again he does not owe the money

BH does, which is not his company. It is a public company with other shareholders whose interests Buffet as manager has to take into account
 
LaMidRighter said:
Economics lesson for you, when his company gets the **** taxed out of it the company will have less money, less money means less to divide up to investors. .
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Do you realize how much a share of Berkshire Hathaway costs?
 
winston53660 said:
Do you realize how much a share of Berkshire Hathaway costs?
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Makes even more of my point though. If it costs that much per share then the investors get screwed even more when they lose value to overtaxation that Buffett is going on about.
 
Lord Tammerlain said:
Again he does not owe the money

BH does, which is not his company. It is a public company with other shareholders whose interests Buffet as manager has to take into account
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He shapes policy for the company and I believe he is a principle. So yes, he does owe money.
 
I don't know why you are surprised. I'm sure that if you looked into it, his firm is not at all unique in this aspect. I bet if the IRS would go after corporations for backed taxes like they do individuals, our budget problems would be solved at least for the next 10 years. Garnish their Profits LOL!
 
LaMidRighter said:
He shapes policy for the company and I believe he is a principle. So yes, he does owe money.
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Yes he shapes the policy for the company to large extent

But it is a tax bill owed by BH not Buffet. If the dispute does go in BH's favor the IRS will collect the money from BH not Buffet. It is not owed by Buffet, but by a company he is the manager of, and a major shareholder in
 
MaggieD said:
Update: Warren Buffett’s Company Owes Nearly $1 Billion in Taxes | TheBlaze.com
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Unrecognized tax benefits doesn't equate to the disputed amount with the IRS. It's an estimate base on assumptions that may or maybe not be realised. So how much of that amount is actually under dispute is what I want to know, and that will actually verify the article's claim.

FYI, if that's all they have to base this claim on, most companies will have a certain amount of unregconised tax benefits.
 
Lord Tammerlain said:
Yes he shapes the policy for the company to large extent

But it is a tax bill owed by BH not Buffet. If the dispute does go in BH's favor the IRS will collect the money from BH not Buffet. It is not owed by Buffet, but by a company he is the manager of, and a major shareholder in
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Doesn't matter. In lieu of Mr. Buffett's comments anything owed is on his shoulders independent of the payor. Fiduciary responsibility be damned in this case because he is already arguing for the opposite of his shareholders best interests by advocating for higher taxes on the wealthy. Every dollar the company loses comes out of a shareholders pocket and his decisions are responsible.
 
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