Chicago - A message from the station manager

The [Wednesday] Papers

By Steve Rhodes

Today in #TopCop:


More commentary/analysis at @BeachwoodReport – I went on a bit of a tweetstorm last night.


More to come.
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Boeing’s Bilious Baloney
“Since Boeing Commercial Airplanes CEO Ray Conner announced a drive to cut the workforce six weeks ago, his team has taken steps expected to eliminate 4,000 jobs by June – and that may be only halfway towards the total cuts this year.
“An internal Boeing document obtained by the Seattle Times reveals that at least one company unit is targeting a 10 percent workforce reduction overall.”
That would be the (ostensibly) Chicago-based Boeing.
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“Many older, highly experienced blue-collar workers will be leaving the company as part of the cuts.”
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It wasn’t widely reported, but Bernie Sanders won the Washington caucuses 72-27 over Hillary Clinton.
See also: Boeing Refuses To Disclose Any State Department-Clinton Foundation E-Mails.
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“Jon Holden, District 751 president of the International Association of Machinists (IAM) union, expressed surprise when informed of the potential scale of the job cuts.

“We have not been notified of these types of reduction numbers,” Holden said.
He said the coming cuts highlight a lack of accountablity for the $8.7 billion in aerospace tax breaks extended to Boeing in 2013 to make sure Boeing built the 777X here.
“This should make it clear to the Legislature why it is important to tie guaranteed job numbers to tax incentives like the other states have done,” Holden said.
Likewise, Ray Goforth, executive director of the Society of Professional Engineering Employees in Aerospace (SPEEA), is exasperated that “we’re the only state that’s not attaching accountability requirements” to corporate tax breaks.

Of course, the City of Chicago and the State of Illinois gave Boeing about $60 million in tax breaks to come here.
Further:
“Consider Boeing, one of Illinois’ biggest publicly traded companies by revenue ($87 billion in 2013). It estimates that its 2014 effective tax rate will be about 23 percent,” the Tribune reported in 2014.

In government filings, however, the Chicago-based airplane-maker lists “total income tax expense” and breaks down how much of that cost is “current” and how much is “deferred.” In 2013, Boeing said its total income tax expense was $1.65 billion on $6.23 billion in pretax profit, mostly in the U.S.
Even so, nearly all of that income tax expense was deferred, or pushed into the future.
Here’s why, according to the company:
“We make a very significant investment in new airplane design, development and production before we receive the revenue from sales,” Boeing spokesman Charles Bickers said, citing spending in the U.S. on its new 787 airliner. “Our current taxes are lower and deferred taxes higher in these periods of investment. That’s only logical.”
Boeing’s deferral strategy has made it a target of such groups as Citizens for Tax Justice. The group and the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy this year released a report in which Boeing was listed among companies that consistently were profitable but had paid little if any taxes for years.

Emphasis added.
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“What strikes you about Boeing is they seem remarkably good at finding ways to pay little or no tax year after year after year,” Matt Gardner, executive director of the institution, told the Trib.
Emphasis added.
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See, for example, Boeing Paid No Federal Income Tax Last Year and Boeing Has Big Tax Refund Coming From Uncle Sam – Again.
See also CEOs Who Make More Than Their Companies Pay In Taxes and When Boeing’s CEO Was Named The Worst Person In Chicago (Item No 10).
And who can forget Washington Just Awarded The Largest Tax Subsidy In U.S. History b/w Boeing Profits Jump 25%.
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From the Beachwood vault:
“Several accounts of United’s move downtown approvingly recall the city’s wooing of Boeing headquarters from Seattle a few years ago, glossing over the fact that, upon reflection, Illinois’s incentive package of $63 million didn’t look so hot compared to Denver’s $18 million package and Dallas’s $14 million package. So we overpaid by about $45 million.”
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Finally: Smithsonian Hall To Be Renamed For Chicago Company That Pays No Taxes.
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Is Jimmy Rollins For Real?
Real enough for your fantasy squad.
From Russia With Love?
Examining the cable channel RT America and the free press.
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BeachBook
This is one of the greatest things I have ever seen. A fantastically reported story to boot.

Posted by The Beachwood Reporter on Wednesday, March 30, 2016

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Bootlegs, please.

Posted by The Beachwood Reporter on Wednesday, March 30, 2016

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Posted by The Beachwood Reporter on Wednesday, March 30, 2016

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Posted by The Beachwood Reporter on Wednesday, March 30, 2016

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TweetWood
A sampling.


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The Beachwood Tip Line: Text and data rates may apply.

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Posted on March 30, 2016