Corporations are paying taxes. US corporate tax receipts as a percentage of GDP are a tick higher than the OECD average. Also, it’s not the “ultra wealthy” primarily benefitting from these buybacks. Most corporate equity is owned by the bottom 99% and pension funds.[1] (Someone with a $5 million retirement account may be very comfortable, but they’re not hiding their money in offshore accounts.)
[1] Most corporate equities are held by retirement plans or foreigners. Just 25% are held in taxable account. Of those, the bulk is owned by people outside the top 0.1%.
Considering the US’s keystone position in global economics, providing safe passage for trade (and relatively stable oil/NG prices, but never mind that) at the cost of a large standing navy, I think a single tick over other OECD countries is a joke. The multinationals owe the US better infrastructure.
Good it's called capitalism. We need creative destruction to move forward.
>> Retirees and the public were left holding the bag.
This!
Largely because the finance industry(or perhaps the world) is run by sales people.
Don't be a sucker, if you don't understand your financial assets in detail(e.g. if you are buying an index fund, understand why, not just based on past performance, go deep, what's the weighting?(currently float weighted which makes it easiest to sell to you, but the worst possible weighting makes it buy high and sell low).
Fuck that's a shit fuck ton of work for just a surface level analysis. But you should do much more research into your mutual funds/stocks than you do your next car purchase.
So yeah, it's not that they were left holding the bag, it's that they were sold free money that turned out to be not so free. Imagine that.
[1] Most corporate equities are held by retirement plans or foreigners. Just 25% are held in taxable account. Of those, the bulk is owned by people outside the top 0.1%.