Why "Tax cuts = Jobs" is a lie: Exxon Mobil

[WonderGrunion]

The common refrain from any right-winger is that the only way to create jobs is through tax cuts. Any common observer would agree that corporate tax rates have never been more favorable than during the Bush administration. Of course in addition to those tax cuts, a company would also need to profit to create jobs. What is the most profitable company in the world today? Exxon Mobil. Don't take my word for it. Check out this link.

Top 10 corporate quaterly earnings of all time

1. Exxon Mobil Corp: 2008, 2Q $11.68 billion

2. Exxon Mobil Corp: 2007, 4Q $11.66 billion

3. Exxon Mobil Corp: 2008, 1Q $10.89 billion

4. Exxon Mobil Corp: 2005, 4Q $10.71 billion

5. Exxon Mobil Corp: 2006, 3Q $10.49 billion

6. Exxon Mobil Corp: 2006, 2Q $10.36 billion

7. Exxon Mobil Corp: 2007, 2Q $10.26 billion

8. Exxon Mobil Corp: 2006, 4Q $10.25 billion

9. Exxon Mobil Corp: 2005, 3Q $9.92 billion

10. Exxon Mobil Corp: 2007, 3Q $9.41 billion

Not bad at all. Exxon Mobil must be creating jobs at a record pace. That is what you'd have to believe if you were a right-winger... or brain dead.

I decide to research what Exxon Mobil recorded for regular employees since 1999. I was able to find this information through the SEC filings of Form 10-K for each year. Those can be viewed at this link here.

Form 10-K filings to the FEC for Exxon Mobil

I'll save you browsing through the documents and list the results below. Prepare to be shocked (or not).
1999 106,900
2000 99,600
2001 97,900
2002 92,500
2003 88,300
2004 85,900
2005 83,700
2006 82,100
2007 80,800

There is no information released for 2008 as yet. So despite the best possible corporate tax rates available and despite record profits compared to any company in existence, Exxon Mobil has cut regular jobs EVERY YEAR of the Bush administration. They've cut a total of 26,100 regular jobs during the entire two years Bush was president. almost 25,000 of those before the Democratic party took back control of the house and senate. So anytime some right wingnut says that tax cuts will create jobs, ask them how many jobs Exxon Mobil has created the last 8 years.

This is my first research piece I've done for Democratic Underground. Please kick and rec.

[Hello_Kitty]

1. K and R. Of course they'll just deny it if you point it out to them.

They'll claim the jobs were created elsewhere.

[WonderGrunion]

13. And the one word response to that is

Where? :shrug:

It would be one thing if this happened while other companies were creating jobs to pick up the slack. Exxon Mobil stands out hard on this by cutting major jobs while reaping excessive profits.

[Aviation Pro]

2. Proud to recommend this.....

...bravo on the fine research.

[WonderGrunion]

11. Thank You

n/m

[on point]

63. Poor Analysis

The standard is not the absolute size of the profit, but the percentage return on the assets they have invested. Are they making 30% profit, like many high tech companies, or 5 % profit like a utility. Without that consideration the numbers are meaningless.

[Lucky Luciano]

71. A good point - see my post #70 for other info I would like to see included.

I think a good study on the topic that the OP wants to tackle would be fascinating. I would love to see the finished research, but that is a huge project.

[FormerDittoHead]

3. Good research. k&r. n/t

[WonderGrunion]

12. Thank you very much

n/m

[Nicholas D Wolfwood]

4. I would love to see even a single shred statistical evidence that support lower taxes = jobs.

I think I'll be waiting a long, long, LONG time for that.

[WonderGrunion]

7. You'll be waiting beyond your lifetime.

Almost all era's of low unemployment were during times of higher top tax brackets. Higher taxes on the wealthy help to pay down the debt and reinforce secure financial markets. The economy is only able to sustain a finite amount of public and private debt. It's really no coincidence that banks begin to fail as we reach the tipping point in total debt in the system.

[jfn302]

78. You've already seen it happen.

Unemployment was at a record high during Jimmie Carter's administration. 12% if I remember correctly. Reagan changed some accounting rules, deregulated industries and provided across the board tax cuts and within the first year of Reagan's presidency unemployment dropped to full employment numbers.

Go back in time a ways to 1932. The New Deal had just been enacted with more of it coming in in '33. Heavy taxes were levied on corporations and high earners to pay for it. Unemployment continued to climb for another year.

There is strong evidence to show that the governments interference actually extended the Great Depression by 7 years. The U.S. didn't truly recover until the war started while the rest of the world had returned to business as ussual years ahead of us.

[FormerDittoHead]

83. Stop listening to Rush!

>"Unemployment was at a record high during Jimmie Carter's administration. 12% if I remember correctly. Reagan changed some accounting rules, deregulated industries and provided across the board tax cuts and within the first year of Reagan's presidency unemployment dropped to full employment numbers."

I remember times being bad during the Carter administration. But this 'Reagan miracle' of deregulation and "across the board" tax cuts, along with your cherry picking the New Deal stats smacks of Fox News thinking.

So I challenged myself and first, checked out the Bureau of Labor Statistics unemployment figures.


Year by year data: http://www.economagic.com/em-cgi/data.exe/feddal/ru

The facts are THE COMPLETE OPPOSITE OF YOUR POST! Unemployment at the end of the first Reagan year, the very period which YOU cite, was HIGHER THAN *ANY* PERIOD IN THE CARTER ADMINISTRATION!

Doing a little more economic research, I now can see you've confused the inflation number with unemployment

>There is strong evidence to show that the governments interference actually extended the Great Depression by 7 years.

The unarguable point is that the biggest problem the New Deal had was that it wasn't big ENOUGH. The spending on WWII made the New Deal spending pale in comparison. That we were hiring people to build tanks and fight a war instead of building (more) bridges and highways is irrelevant to the fact that we were spending money at a rate never before dreamed of. The biggest problem with the New Deal was that the Republicans FOUGHT IT.

>The U.S. didn't truly recover until the war started while the rest of the world had returned to business as ussual years ahead of us.

OK, here's where you entered fantasy land.

In the years AFTER WWII, the United States enjoyed a prosperity and growth of the middle class that had never been seen in the history of the world. In the history of the WORLD. Check the tax rates THEN. It was only by the grace of the Marshall Plan that Europe was able to grow out of the ruins of WWII as quickly as it did. Now look at that last sentence you wrote. What universe are you living in? "business as usual"??? Think of England, France, Italy, Germany, Japan, etc. etc etc. These places were not that nice to live in during 1945-1960, compared to the US.

But after 1960, and especially starting in the early 70's, these Western European countries did start to succeed. That's because they nationalized health care and were wasting/spending only a fraction on national defense as we did. Instead of spending money on billion dollar bomber jets that would never be used, they built airports, highways, high speed trains, bridges, and subsidized their steel industries.

Economics doesn't happen in a vacuum. I understand simple numbers don't tell the whole picture. But if you believe in what you wrote, you're living in some bizarro-world.

[LiberalFighter]

61. Might be a good epitaph on someone's gravestone.

"All those tax cuts and not one single job."


Maybe someone can create something better.

[AndyA]

5. You should send this to Olbermann and Maddow.

They might want to use it on their shows. Very interesting, thanks for doing the research and posting.

[WonderGrunion]

6. Good idea.

I just forwarded it to them. I hope this gets used more often as a rebuttal.

[w4rma]

8. That is the best, most concise, easiest to understand evidence I have ever seen on this topic. (nt)

[WonderGrunion]

9. If any complaint could be found in it.

It's that it only features one company. But it is the one company that has benefited most from the Bush tax policy. If even the best performing company in the world can't create jobs from the Bush tax policy, what real evidence is there that ANY company can.

[AtheistCrusader]

42. It is also an extremely unusual company.

A company that cuts production, to maintain prices, instead of expanding exploration, development, etc, and buys back stock/pays out dividends. It's basically a company with a goal of eliminating itself. Sort of winding down. Hard to explain. It's a really bad pick for this particular comparison.

I believe the OP's point has merit, but it's not the best example.

[jfn302]

77. Your argument doesn't hold up.

1) Your profit listing is from most to least and not in time sequence which would more accurately show the ups and downs that the company has experienced in the last few years.

2) You are talking about amount of profit verse number of employees. As mentioned earlier, you should be looking at what percentage of revenue is the profit. For Exxon Mobil it has been hovering around 10% for a very long time. Google made more than 25% last year yet nobody is pointing fingers at them.

3) Because of a combination of recent accounting rules and executive compensation packages there is no way to tell how many people actually work for a company. Recent accounting rules put employee compensation under expenses. Contractors are under capital, not expense. Executive compensation is tied to stock price. Stock price is strongly influenced by revenue to expense ratios. Executives have been reducing direct employees and hiring contractors to fill the vacant slots to improve revenue to expense ratios. With the higher ratios, the stock price climbs and executives get a bigger paycheck when they cash out their stock options.

So, unless you can quantify the number of total people employed by Exxon Mobil, direct or contractor, you can't make a statement one way or the other.

But, here's an interesting point to look at. 2Q 2008 profit was $11.68 Billion. Profit margin was about 10%. Which means Gross Revenue was $116.8 Billion. A year earlier, profit was $10.26 Billion, Revenue at $102.6 Billion. Which means they spent $12.78 Billion dollars more in 2Q 2008 than in 2Q 2007. Hmm.. Where did that money go? Seems to me they spent it on products and services from other companies that pay employees. What was the profit margin of those other companies? Did they cut personnel too? Or, did they have to hire more people to cover the extra work that needed to be done to provide those products and service?

Why is it that people insist on pointing fingers at the oil companies when they make only a reasonable profit margin, but do massive quantity? Yet, nobody looks at people like Oprah, who has amassed a net worth of over $1.5 Billion for herself while only employing 221 people? Why is she not evil?

[onetwo]

79. Where did the extra $12.8B go? Who cares?

Here's a better question: Would they have spent that extra $12.78 billion if revenue did not increase by a similar number?

Answer: No. It is the demand for their products and services that forced their hand.

For-profit companies do not increase overhead unless there is a corresponding increase in demand. A windfall in the form of a tax cut or rebate does not motivate a business to destroy their margins by hiring more people or doing anything else economically stimulative (rather, they simply hoard the extra cash).

[jfn302]

80. You are correct..

..about for profit companies not increasing overhead unless there is a corresponding increase in demand. But, a tax break is a reduction in overhead, correct?

The oil industry is a great example for looking at how many times a product is taxed before you buy it.

The government gets a royalty fee for each barrel of oil pumped.
They get a tariff on each barrel that is imported.
They charge fees for plant licensing.
Fees for drilling.
Fees for inspections.
Income tax for the company.
Income tax for the employees.
Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid all have to be paid.
The independent truckers who deliver the product to the stations have to pay their fair share of taxes.
Income
Fuel taxes
Vehicle Registration
Vehicle inspection
The station owners have their own set of taxes to pay.
Then, even after the government has taxes every step of the way from the ground to the pump, the government thinks it needs even more so it adds another 18.4 cents per gallon tax directly to the consumer.

In reality, the consumer is paying all the other taxes as well.

I think a tax break to the oil companies just might cut my costs at the pump.

Problem is, we are talking about oil companies. There is huge demand for their product, and it infiltrates every aspect of our life. Our power generation is done mostly by natural gas and light oil. Coal is heavy in certain parts of the country, but environmentalists are trying to shut them down because of the soot the plants put into the air. The computers we are typing on are impossible without the oil industry. How much of the computer is made of plastic? The ag-industry has yet to come up with a corn starch based product that is as durable as plastic. Most of the clothes we wear have polyester in them. The protectants that we cover wood with to keep them beautiful. Cd's, phones, iPods, TVs, microwaves, refrigerators, Beds, Carpet, you name it. Nearly everything has some component that is derived from oil.

Hate the oil industry all you want. They bring us the quality of life we live today. I hope you are happy being a hypocrite. Enjoy the lifestyle but hate the producer.

To look at the real benefits of tax relief to business, you would need to study businesses that are most effected by tax increases or decreases. Small business that employ less than 100 people are the life bread of the nation. They provide 70% of the jobs in America. They are the ones that taxes hit the hardest as well. They are the ones that lay off 1 or 2 people when their tax load goes up $50,000.00 in a year like it did in Texas last year. Or, they cut back the hours that employees can work. People still have a job, but they can't make ends meet now because of a lack of hours. These are the real issues with raising or lowering taxes. Not studies on huge companies that have endless demand for their product.

[janet118]

10. Trickle down so long . . .

looks like up to me.

[WonderGrunion]

19. Any suitably advanced science is indiscernable from magic.

Seriously though, we've had two decades of proof that trickle down economics simply doesn't work. Why anyone still buys into that lie is simply mind boggling.

[AlbertCat]

52. Indeed

The Laffer Curve...upon which "trickle down" eco is based, has been known to be a joke since the 1980's.

[glitch]

14. Excellent post. Far better than what we can find in most newspapers or tvnews. K & R

PS great DU username, belated welcome!

[WonderGrunion]

17. Thanks for that

I've been here for years but don't contribute much. My username is based on a superhero character I created on the internet back in 1989. Look up "Superguy" on wikipedia for more info if you'd like.

[glitch]

21. Woa, you have been here for years, sorry.

For some reason I thought I couldn't click on profile because I can't afford to donate anymore. Whadya know about that?
I will look up Superguy, I love early internet. I've been on it since the 80s myself. Does this mean we're old-timers?
:hi:

[WonderGrunion]

23. I think I'm losing my donor star soon too.

Yeah we're old-timers now. Gotta get on that AARP-ANET soon. :fistbump:

[glitch]

24. Lol! nt

[ooglymoogly]

27. AARP is a pug insurance organization for profit, whose propaganda brought

us the privatization of medicare....whose privatization is costing taxpayers billions more than before it was privatized. Bushonomics 101. AARP used to be an honorable and useful group to belong to before it was taken over by ruthless pug thugs who saw billions in profit by exploiting the elderly...just say'n.

Yeah I know you were just joshin.

[WonderGrunion]

28. I agree with you completely.

AARP stopped having senior's best interests at heart as soon as they became a Medicare Part B insurer. They now are dedicated to killing universal health care because it would destroy their cash cow. I used it primarily as an "old-age" joke and it's closeness to the old ARPANET networking service in name.

[rucognizant]

60. Yes Don't join AARP!

You can get the same motle discount with AAA, if you are traveling! AS well as road service if you need it.

[bullwinkle428]

15. I've seen wingnuts claim that Exxon Mobil pays more in taxes

than they earn in profits on an annual basis, so I have to wonder who ties their wingnut-wingtips every morning!!

:crazy: :crazy: :crazy:

[progressoid]

16. Yeah, I had one tell me about all the money they spend on R&D and

searching for oil. :eyes:

[WonderGrunion]

18. Most of that is sunsidized through the government as well.

Those scanning satellites they use to look for oil without drilling are heavily funded by the government.

[Abq_Sarah]

51. That's obviously bullshit

They pay about 42% if my math is correct.

http://finance.yahoo.com/q/is?s=XOM&annual

[VPStoltz]

55. There is no way that little chart tells the whole story.

The corporate tax rate is far, far lower than that.

[Abq_Sarah]

56. The numbers match what I've seen

On every other financial site. They are straight from the SEC filings.

[VPStoltz]

54. That my friend is utter bullfroggy!

After working their way through all their exemptions and loopholes and offshore holdings, the average corporate tax rate is an amazingly restrictive: 7%

[Sirveri]

20. K & R & BOOKMARKED.

Great for debunking idiotic RW talking points based in fantasy land.

[WonderGrunion]

22. Truth does seem to be liberally biased

Doesn't it? :kick:

[noiretextatique]

25. great research

anyone who was around for the raygun taxcuts knew bush's "taxcuts for the wealthy = jobs" meme was complete bullshit.
what is truly galling is we have yet another glaring example of the failure of trickle down voodoo...and republiclones are still pushing this same old crap. your research shows why...more profits for management and shareholders, but less jobs for everyone else.
the more we can do to expose this insidious LIE, the better. bravo :applause:

[WonderGrunion]

30. I appreciate that.

I was a teenager during the Reagan years. He prompted me to become a democrat. My first election I caucused for Jesse Jackson. I see the election of Pres. Obama as the culmination of his campaign's dream.

[LiberalFighter]

62. They just left a few words out.

Or ran out of breath with excitement.

Taxcuts for the wealthy = jobs for the wealthy.

[Lucky Luciano]

72. I find it so funny that Bush the First first used the term Voodoo economics! haha

[WonderGrunion]

26. I've been asked to compile the same stats for other oil companies.

I'll try to compile and post those sometime tomorrow morning as an update. I suspect the trends hold true across the board,but more research is always a good thing.

[dothemath]

29. feelin' better .................

Discourse level way up. I rarely use STFU, et. al., anymore. Why? The morans, meaning about half (actually 46%) of the delusional, racist, homophobic redneck pukes that slimed up these blogs prior to Nov. 4 are GONE FROM HERE!

Back in the day, every election cycle saw democrats scrambling and struggling to raise enough money to campaign against republics. Now comes Pres. Obama. Being able to compete on a level financial playing field was an absolute necessity. Not only did he set a new paradigm for doing so, he buried the republics under a mountain of financial resources. When the pukes ran ads in places guaranteed to go viral through Rush, Sean and others, Pres. Obama's campaign ran more ads, more places and the same bloggers who did the grassroots work digging out small campaign donations from millions of heretofore left-out interested citizens and made sure they got noticed.

And the part I love the most? The former republic power brokers are watching their financial base dry up, their political power base reduced to a few southern states and they have nothing to offer beyond what doesn't work, as Pres. Obama has so forcefully pointed out.

I am feeling a hell of a lot better, every day, in almost every way.
Thank you, Pres. Obama.

[HughBeaumont]

31. K & R. It's not just oil companies . . .

. . . It's ALL conglomerates!

The WORST job creation during a two term president, WORST for a recovery from an official recession, even WORSE than his old Man's recession. Bewsh and his failed economic policies were responsible for one of, if not THE, biggest wealth heists/transfers in the modern era, almost doubling the national debt, coddling the wealthy and leaving us with a never-going-to-be-paid bill.

Obama will come out of this looking amazing if he does even one QUARTER of what he says he'll do. The Bewsh "legacy" is JUST. THAT. BAD.

[WonderGrunion]

33. Great article

I hadn't noticed it at the time you posted it and I certainly wasn't looking to usurp your research. I just got curious and googled some info after listening to all the repukes on 24/7 news stations yammering about how tax cuts create jobs.

[psychmommy]

32. good work wonder.

thanks for sharing. i hope this is the first of many research projects on du.

[louis-t]

34. Jeez, was bush only pres 2 years?

Seemed like a lot longer.B-)

[WonderGrunion]

36. I noticed that just after the edit period expired.

I claim repressed memory syndrome. :dunce:

[libodem]

35. I'd love to see an audit of the

money they spend on lobbists, who it goes to, and how much.

[WonderGrunion]

37. I bet there's no concrete records of that information.

It would be nice to see how much of that profit went to lobbyists while they were cutting jobs.

[boomerbust]

38. But

Massive tax cuts for Exxon in 2005 kept energy prices low.:eyes:

[Uncle Joe]

39. You've done excellent work, WonderGrunion.

Thanks for your research.:thumbsup:

Kicked and recommended.

[zeos3]

40. Good Job! Thanks! eom

[hay rick]

41. K & R

[liberal N proud]

43. GOP Senators meet Eisenstein's definition of insanity

Keep throwing tax cuts at the problem expecting different results.

[jfn302]

81. So, lets do the opposite.

I'm going to ask the government to tax you heavier, and give it to me. I need the money since I haven't found any customers in the last couple of month and your support of high taxation tells me you have too much money.

[WonderGrunion]

84. Rather than attack democratic presidents and policies

How about you do some research and show one single bit of evidence that any tax cut in history has resulted in any jobs having ever been created in the United States.

[David Zephyr]

44. Great stuff! K&R.

:thumbsup:

[Brucie Kibbutz]

45. excellent post K&R

:applause:

[defendandprotect]

46. I'm sure someone else is saying this . . .

I would think the right-wing would reply that the oil industry is facing "peak" oil --

do they admit to that? -- and, therefore, the higher earnings were based not on more

sales but higher prices!

This would also be somewhat true of credit card companies/banks which profited from

higher oil prices and therefore higher commissions on their cards.


Your results are probably also true of any, still existing, corporation that actuallty

made profits during the Bush years. I say "actually" because I'm not really sure --

other than ExxonMobil what reported profits may have been real and which were based on

sophisticated bookkeeping and questionable auditing.

There's also been a tendency to latch onto employee assets to keep corporations afloat one

way or another --- like borrowing from pension funds to redo department stores!

And probably many other stunts I'm not familiar with.

[jfn302]

82. I think you hit the nail on the head..

..with your comment about bookkeeping. But the problem is in the rules that corporations have to follow in order to provide records for the government. Congress, which has been controlled by Democrats for, what?, 6 years, sets the rules on how companies have to keep their books. If Democrats can fix everything, why hasn't this problem been fixed? Probably because the people in charge like Charlie Rangle are writing laws they don't understand and never intend to follow themselves.

The reason why it hasn't been fixed is because the current bookkeeping method shows companies to be more profitable, when in fact their real overhead is much higher. Since the companies are more profitable, the government gets more tax revenue. If capital expenditure was brought under regular expenses then companies would appear less profitable. Tax revenues would drop. Stock prices would be lower. But companies would actually be worth their 'true' price to earnings. Companies would not be able to find creative ways to shuffle costs into the 'capital' budget in order to push their stock price up.

As for the tendency to latch onto employee assets. I'd have to say that there is a 'creative' CFO working for the company that has his stock price in mind instead of his companies bottom line. It is un-ethical to put your company in jeopardy just to show growth and increase your own cash flow, regardless of your political leanings.

The problem in our country isn't Left or Right. It is Right or Wrong.

We need leaders that have unquestionable integrity. We can trust that they are going to do the right thing regardless what the issue is. We need to clean house of all the corrupt politicians on both sides of the isle. If they have been caught with their hands in the cookie jar like Charlie Rangle, William Jefferson, Ted Stevens, Dianne Wilkerson, and others, they need to be removed from office and held accountable to the full extent of the law. They have been stealing money from all of us and using it for their own aggrandizement while we toil every day just to keep food on the table and lights in the house.

I don't fault anyone for working hard and getting rich. That is what the American Dream is all about. I don't hate Bill Gates for his billions of dollars. I hate the faults in Windows, but I don't hate him. I don't hate Sam Walton and his descendants for their riches from Wal-marts success. I hate that they switched to almost all China made products so a huge portion of our GDP is paid directly to a communist regime. But, the company works hard at being the discount store you want to go to. They do a very good job and are very successful because of it.

I fault people for doing the wrong thing. Enron, MCI, Merrile Lynch, World-Com, Arthur Anderson. These companies are the tip of the iceberg. But, it's not the companies themselves that are the culprits. It is the people within the company that make the decision to do the wrong thing. The company is not evil. The person or persons making the unethical decision is or are. Let's hold those individuals accountable for their actions, rather than trying to destroy industries for their success.

[Autonomy]

47. No offense, but...

this is woefully incomplete for economics research. I don't mean to be a dick. It's just that any conservative with a couple classes in econ will cut this research to ribbons. You've not demonstrated at all what the correlation between tax cuts and jobs is (even if it is zero). A con-econ will probably say that without the tax cuts there would have been even more jobs lost.

I actually find it hard to predict what they will say, since I don't think like them, and they can pull some wild ass shit out of their collective ass. Just a heads up.

[TBF]

48. The OP is not defending his dissertation ...

Simply answering their talking point with simple facts that illustrate how innane it is. I doubt it is intended to show causal relationships. Of course, you're not going to get any republicans to provide that for you on the other side either.

[WonderGrunion]

49. I said the same thing in post #9

It does only cover one single company. At the request of another poster, I'm compiling the same information for the rest of the petroleum industry. I come from a science background, not an economics background. The first rule of scientific proof is objective observation. Repukes say that the only way to create jobs is through tax cuts to businesses. If there is no verifiable empirical evidence of that, then their theory is the one lacking evidence. It is their assertions that requires proof. I am simply pointing out the most obvious example of the lack of proof.

[Lucky Luciano]

70. I would like to see the results of your research, but

I see no reason why you should restrict your results to the oil and gas industry. Try companies across the spectrum if you want real results that people will care about to refute thug talking points.

Note in what follows: ETF = exchange traded fund and looking up the members of the various funds which should be easy to do on the internet. Using all the members is overkill, but it should be broken down so that the names selected are reasonably random and distributed so that it represents empoloyment distribution in the US.

Materials - Use the XLB ETF
Oil and Gas, Oil Services - Try both the XLE and OIH ETFs.
Financials - The XLF ETF for big financials, KRE for regional banks
Homebuilders - The XHB ETF
Consumer Dicretionary - The XLY ETF, RTH or XRT for retail.
Consumer Staples - The XLP ETF.
Airlines see the ETF XLA
Healthcare - PPH ETF for Pharma, BBH for Biotech
Tech - Use the XLK ETF, SMH for semiconductors, SWH for software
Utilities - Use the XLU ETF
Industrials - The XLI ETF.

Also for smaller cap names which should definitely be included,
consider looking at the IWM (representing the Russell 2000 small cap index) and the MDY which represents the S&P 400 midcap stocks.

As far as small and private businesses, I am not sure immediately how to do a study, but this would be a fascinating study to me if someone actually did it!

[sammythecat]

65. Yeah, but, down here among the hoi polloi,

plain and simple statistics like these have a lot of value. Exxon-Mobil gets treated royally for the last 10 years, they make absolutely stupendous profits, and they cut their work force by 20 percent. Right or wrong, people hear something like that and they remember it. It'll likely resonate a lot more, and stick in their memory much longer, than the conservative talking head's convoluted counter argument.

[wiggs]

50. This and almost every other false RW meme is easily debunked and disproved. So

the question is...why don't pundits, journalists, and (most of all) dem leaders make the case? Why is every issue so easily confused and distorted so that public discourse is non-functional? Why is it so hard for dems to frame an issue correctly?

It's not just the media....

Good post wondergrunion. I hope I wake up tomorrow and read the same thing in the Times.

[sammythecat]

66. Well, it's the next day and the morning's almost over.

This is the only place I've seen this mentioned. Makes you wonder, doesn't it? It often seems like the Democratic leadership doesn't WANT to be successful.

It takes a lot of money to get in a position of power in Washington, and that money is burdened with a lot of interest that must be paid. That's an ideal setup for corruption. I don't like that I've become this way, but become cynical to the point that I think all politicians are corrupt until proven otherwise. Senators and Representatives of the caliber of the late Paul Wellstone are rare as celebrities in WalMart.

[VPStoltz]

53. For every $1 of tax cuts, only $1.03 of spending is generated.

For every $1 on infrastructure spent creates $1.56 spent.
Each dollar of food stamps generates $1.73 of money returned to sellers.

Tax cuts are a joke.

Any $ saved by Exxon through tax cuts end up in the pockets of its shareholders.
They never see the work force, they don't think about the work force, they don't CARE about the work force as long as their dividend comes through.

[mentalslavery]

57. Thats funny, the "news" has always told me the opposite

Such a sorry, sorry state of affairs.

[tclambert]

58. That's the kind of info they like on the Stock Market Watch thread.

Numbers plus economics. I'll be sure to mention your good work over there.

The financial companies that received TARP money have pretty much all been laying off, too. There is not a businessman in the world who thinks it is good business to hire unnecessary employees just to burn up extra cash they have lying around. They hire when they see OTHER people with money, potential customers, and need more employees to filch the money out of these other people's pockets. They hire new employees when they see a way to make more money than it costs to hire them. The employees' work pays for their salaries and benefits. If they have some up front capital expenditures associated with hiring, they borrow the money for that and expect the revenue generated by the new employees to cover the payments.

Anyway, you did good research. DUers will like it. Republicans will regard it as an assault on their core belief system. They will just see your data as a test of faith. They'll close their eyes and believe harder and hope you and your inconvenient reality go away.

[Baikonour]

59. Great thread.

Thanks for the info.

[sammythecat]

64. Nice bit of research there WonderGrunion.

I like info like that. It's short, easy to remember, any republican dope can understand it, and it is very, very, telling.

[Sarah Ibarruri]

67. It's true. Tax cuts is just more bs lies from the Repukes nt

[Honeycombe8]

68. Great research and post. nt

[sofa king]

69. Not only that but in the '90s they were TWO huge companies.

I watched firsthand as Mobil jettisoned thousands of people through the early 1990s. The corporate office just outside the Beltway went from 2500 employees to less than half of that in two years. Their layoff patterns, whether by accident or design, left behind the ruthless, the sociopathic, the office politicians, and the criminals. Any survivors of those early purges have probably moved up to the highest levels of management by now.

It led me to come up with a metaphor, which I still use on occasion: You have a battleship, but you want to downsize to a cruiser, so you park the battleship two miles offshore and sink it. The survivors become the crew of the cruiser. Then you want to downsize from a cruiser to a destroyer, so you do the same thing.

Now, the crew of your destroyer might be a reasonable cross-section of qualified people ready to do their jobs, but they all have one thing in common: they're really good swimmers, and after two sinkings, you can bet your ass that swimming is their true area of expertise, rather than whatever job they are expected to perform.

[bleever]

73. Great research.

I'll look forward to reading more from you.

[Turbineguy]

74. No company hires anybody

simply because their profits go up.

But RWnuts have to have policies that fit on bumper stickers.

And single syllable words are best.

[valerief]

75. Excellent. We always knew it was a lie, but it's good to see it in black and white. nt

[DissedByBush]

76. The two sets of numbers have little to do with each other

The first covers less than two years of the second. I also see 7,300 of those jobs lost under Clinton which is about the same average rate of job loss as under Bush.

Look at this chart where corporate profits and tax receipts went up as tax rates went down. Obviously lower taxes don't mean less tax revenue.

Now as far as the jobs go it is completely different. There is a question of what the businesses do with the extra profits. Do they hire more workers, give it to the shareholders (that includes you and me) or just keep the cash and dole it out as bonuses to the fat cats? Did the extra profits come because they shipped jobs out of the country?

Whatever the rate is, it is obvious that the way to keep people employed is to give companies encouragement to spend profits on extra workers, expanding the company. The only way I can see to do that is to give them a tax break for every worker they hire, making it more expensive to keep the cash. Conversely, companies that ship jobs out of the country should find it prohibitively expensive to do so at tax time.

The tax rate in general won't do much to help jobs, but targeted taxes will.

[WonderGrunion]

85. I strongly support targeted tax cuts.

It's one of the few ways that government can actually influence social and economic policy. But the conservative viewpoint that the only way to create jobs is through tax cuts is laughably absurd.

[Perky]

86. Thank you

The proof , though well intened is substantially flawed.

This is net revenue and employment not tax burden and employment.

Beyond that. populist sentiment aside, Petro companies are not a good measure of what the OP is trying to prove. FIrst there is a great bit of leveraging in the space and subcontracting to third parties is pretty commonplace and that will not show up in Exxon's numbers. Secondly, Oil/Gas is not a growth industry. WHile they are making hand over fist, that shdoes not necessaruly indicat that new obs would follow. Demand for gas is flat and Exxon only real growth would be on the retail side and they may be awardinf franchises much more often than building thier own stores.

I am not suggesting that that the OP is flatout wrong in his supposition, just that the data provided has problems

[WonderGrunion]

87. I'm not trying to PROVE anything.

Much to the contrary, I'm trying to disprove the Republic talking point that "Tax Cuts = Jobs" in the simplest possible way. This company (Exxon Mobil) had heaping cartloads of tax cuts and did nothing to create jobs. The only point of displaying their profits was to show that those tax cuts did more than simply offset business costs, they created profits which COULD have been used for expansion and job growth. They chose not to do that. Thus "Tax Cuts =/= Jobs"

Note to anyone arguing against my thesis. Read the title of the OP. I never contend that "Profits create jobs" or "Raising taxes creates jobs" or even that "Tax cuts never create jobs". MOX had huge freaking tax cuts. They also had a profit, meaning they could have created jobs if they wished to. They didn't create jobs. Quite the opposite, they cut jobs massively.

All I did was show that the stupid GOP talking point "Tax Cuts = Jobs" was false and demonstratively so.

[AJH032]

88. Of course it's a lie. Think about it.

If you had the expenses of paying employees and paying taxes, and the government came to you and said that your tax expense is going down, would that make you WANT to increase employee expenses? Of course not. The only thing that would make a company want to increase the size of its payroll is if it has to in order to keep up with consumer demand for goods/services.