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The Daily Insight

How can a corporation not pay taxes?

Author

Emma Jordan

Published Apr 04, 2026

Large multinational companies can still save billions of dollars by using foreign subsidiaries and tax havens. Other methods used by Fortune 500 companies to reduce taxes include accelerated depreciation and stock options, while some industries even offer specific tax breaks.

How do I get my tax waived?

Write a letter to the IRS requesting a penalty waiver. State the reason you weren’t able to pay, and provide copies—never the originals—of the documents you’re offering as evidence. You should mail the letter to the same IRS address that notifies you about your penalty charges.

What corporations did not pay taxes last year?

FedEx and Nike are among those found to have avoided U.S. tax liability for three straight years. Just as the Biden administration is pushing to raise taxes on corporations, a new study finds that at least 55 of America’s largest paid no taxes last year on billions of dollars in profits.

How many corporations paid no taxes last year?

Twenty-six corporations have paid no federal income taxes since 2017, according to the report, including such household names as Nike, FedEx and Dish Network.

How does Nike no tax?

Instead of paying federal income tax at the 21 percent legal rate, it paid nothing and received a net federal income tax rebate of $109 million of previously paid taxes. This works out to a 33.6 percent effective tax rate that Nike would have paid on those “offshore” profits.

How many US corporations pay no federal taxes?

At least 55 of the largest corporations in America paid no federal corporate income taxes in their most recent fiscal year despite enjoying substantial pretax profits in the United States.

Who are the companies that are not paying taxes?

The companies avoiding income taxes in 2020 represent very different sectors of the U.S. economy: Food conglomerate Archer Daniels Midland enjoyed $438 million of U.S. pretax income last year and received a federal tax rebate of $164 million.

When did corporations start to avoid paying taxes?

ITEP reports have documented such tax avoidance since the early years of the Reagan administration’s misguided tax-cutting experiment. A widely cited ITEP analysis of an eight-year period (2008 through 2015) confirmed that federal tax avoidance remained rampant before the TCJA.

Do you pay all of the corporate tax?

But others think workers pay far more of the corporate tax. For example, Kevin Hassett, former Chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers in the Trump Administration, argued that workers may bear the entire corporate income tax (or even more).