Oil Companies Get $33 billion in Taxpayer Handouts

[Ichingcarpenter]

On news of the massive profits reported by ExxonMobil today, ABC News crunched the numbers and has found that the combined profits of the top 5 US oil companies was $1.5 trillion last year.

The news report points out that this staggering amount of profit is more that the total GDP of Canada, at $1.43 trillion last year.

As many have rightly pointed out that while these profits margins are staggering, they are not out of line relative to other companies like Microsoft. However, where these profits do become obscene is when you consider how much US oil companies receive in taxpayer subsidies.

Here's the breakdown of how your tax dollars will be spent on subsidizing Big Oil over the next 5 years:

Tax breaks = $23.2 billion

Royalty relief = $3.8 billion

Research and development subsidies = $1.6 billion

Accounting gimmicks = $4.3 billion


http://www.huffingtonpost.com/kevin-grandia/massive-oil-profits-and-3_b_116132.html

[Tandalayo_Scheisskopf]

1. When will this sort of bullshit end? nt

[peanut2010]

2. Hopefully January 20 2009

although I am sort of an optimist.