The Dawson news. (Dawson, Ga.) 1889-current, 1925-11-10
IS TRYING TO
REDUCE THE TAX BURDEN
CORPORATIONS PAID TAXES
OF TWO AND HALF BILLION
DOLLARS LAST YEAR.
MANY ARE WITHOUT A PROFIT
About Five ighths of the Amount Is
State, County and Municipal. Ev-
cry Dollar Paid for Salaries Is
Matched by One for Taxes.

State, County and Municipal. Ev-
cry Dollar Paid for Salaries Is
Matched by One for Taxes.
Trying to get taxes cut is proving
an undisguised blessing to big BUSH
ness. 1t is better than a liberal edu-
cation, for business in Washington, in
force to beg congress to reduce all sort
of taxes, is finding out things about it
self that it never dreamed existed.
And whether business gets what it
wants or not-mostly not, for it can't
possibly have all it's asking for-bat-
talions of high powered statesmen and
executives are going back home after
the scrap is over much wiser set of
men, writes Harden Colfax, the Wash
ington correspondent.
Figured Out by Treasury.
Take for instance, the simple little
thing, how much business is paying
in taxes Of all kinds. The treasury has
figured it out to the dollar; nobody
else could guess within $500,000 900.
Here are the treasury's figures:
Federal taxes 1887, 10000.
State, county, city and all other
taxes $1635,035,8S4
Total $2,570.142,682.
That, down to the small silver, is
the amount of money paid in taxes to
government treasures by all the cor
porations in the United States last
year. 1t will be observed that nearly
twice as much was paid to states and
lesser divisions than to the federal
government. The figure represents the
grand total payments of 382,SS3 cor
porations on 1928 business. OF that
number 212,535, or less than sixty per,
cent, made a profit. The others did
not, but many Of them paid taxes just
the same.
Thus lesson number one sinks
home with the internal revenue COM
missioner, Uncle Sans tax collector
in chief, as teacher. Lesson number 2,
translated into the jargon of5the street,
can be summarized about as follows:
For every dollar you big business
men paid your high salaried or under
paid executives, as the case may be,
you paid another dollar in taxes. If
you're paying a genius 100000 year
you're matching that 100000 with an
other 100000 to the tax collector.
Neck and neck the payments run: dol
lar for dollar. Here are the figures
gathered from every corporation do
ing business in the United States.
Paid in taxes $3.50, 1902.
Paid in salaries to officers $2,575,-
S75, 1856" \
Lesson number three comes along
in due course. 1t runs about as fol-
lows:
Expenses "a Per Cent.
you fellows did a whale OF bust
ness in 1923. Your total sales of ali
sorts, plus all other kinds, run to $119,-
COG, 100000 On the average every
man, woman and child in the United
States spent more than 500 in trad
| ing with you during the year But
Your net profit on that tremendous
turnover was just a shade above six
per cent You made, net, on your 1923
business $7,634, 263,4 43. Your expenses
OF doing business were nearly "a per
cent OF that sum, or upwards OF SILL
coo, 100000"
And here comes the end Of the les
son:
You paid one-third Of your net
profit to the tax collector"
Figure it out: Net profits, 1854
263 ,443; total tax payments $3.50
162, 682.
Part Of these heavy tax payments,
however, are included in the big item
of expenses, running to $lll000 000,
4n 4of
units are so included; the payments
TO the federal government are not. In
other words, part of that $3.50 0O0,-
600 tax bill was deducted, along With
other expenses, from gross earnings
before arriving at the figures which
represent net earnings, or %,o34 ,263,-
443. Now out of that total of net earn
ings must come the federal tax, or
1887, 106,798, before we can get an ac-
curate line OF net income, or the
amount available for distribution
among stockholders.
Making the deduction, net income
OF al the corporations doing business
in America is found to be $6,607, 1885,
645 on 1923 transactions. That is at
the rate Of 555 per cent on total sales
and other income.
In other words, out of every dollar
taken in by American corporations in
1928 941a cents was paid out for the
thousands OF items composing its rum
ming expenses, and So cents remain
ed in the treasury as profit The fig
ure, Of course, is an average one.
Net Money Makers.
Studied in that light, the corpora
ton hardly sizes up as the money ma
ker il has been misrepresented
These figures, and many others that
go along in detail on the same general
subject are not estimates. They are
cold facts, gathered by the federal
treasury from the tax returns Of every
corporation in the country. They are
before the ways and means committee
and are being studied by the business
interests appearing before that COM
mittee to ask for this, that or the 9TH
er kind Of tax reduction.
The strongest man in the world is