Report: Big Companies Aren’t Paying PA Taxes
Leaving small businesses and citizens to shoulder the state tax burden
Ten Fortune 500 companies paid no Pennsylvania taxes at all during a five-year span from 2008-2012, a think tank reported Thursday afternoon.
The Pennsylvania Budget and Policy Center said that of 269 Fortune 500 companies doing business in the state, 90 paid no state income tax during at least one year of the study. “When profitable corporations don’t pay taxes, other businesses and the rest of us pay more,” said Sharon Ward, director of the Pennsylvania Budget and Policy Center.
Other findings in the report:
- 90 companies paid no state income tax at all in at least one year, and 38 companies avoided taxes in two or more years.
- 10 companies, including Boeing, Merck, and Rockwell Automation, paid no state income tax at all over the five-year period covered by the study.
- The average weighted state corporate income tax rate is 6.25 percent, but the 269 companies paid an average rate of just 3.06 percent.
- In Pennsylvania, PPL and PNC Financial Services Group paid average income tax rates over the five-year period of less than 1 percent; Cigna, Airgas, H.J. Heinz, Allegheny Technologies, and Air Products & Chemicals paid between 1 and 2 percent on average; Wesco International and AmerisourceBergen paid between 2.1 and 3 percent on average; Consol Energy, Hershey, and Comcast paid between 3.1 and 4 percent on average; PPG Industries, Dick’s Sporting Goods, and Universal Health Services paid between 4.1 and 5 percent on average; and UGI paid 6 percent on average.
- The 269 companies examined collectively avoided paying $73.1 billion in state corporate income tax.
The full report is available here.
