Corporate Tax Avoidance
325 companies avoided $148,533,430,000 in federal income tax on $1.1 trillion of profit in 2025
325 companies avoided $148,533,430,000 in federal income tax on $1.1 trillion of profit in 2025
325 companies avoided
$148,533,430,000
in federal income tax on $1.1 trillion
of profit in 2025
With earnings season now underway, dozens of huge corporations have disclosed paying single-digit federal income tax rates thanks to tax cuts included in President Trump’s “One Big Beautiful Bill.”
Amazon, Alphabet, Meta, and Tesla collectively avoided $51 billion in federal income tax for 2025. Tesla and Palantir reported paying zero federal income tax at all.
President Trump’s 2017 tax law and the recently passed OBBBA have led to substantial tax avoidance from the nation’s largest corporations. Corporate profits continue to soar while corporate tax avoidance reaches extreme levels. That’s why reforming the corporate income tax and closing loopholes is so critical to a fair tax code.
Top Three Federal Tax Avoiders
Alphabet
Reported federal tax rate: 8.01%
Federal Tax breaks include
- Depreciation Deduction$3.3 billion
- FDII Deduction$3.9 billion
- R&D Credit$2.1 billion
- Stock Options$2.6 billion
Amazon.com
Reported federal tax rate: 1.37%
Federal Tax breaks include
- R&D Expensing$4 billion
- Depreciation Deduction$6.5 billion
- R&D Credit$2.4 billion
- Stock Options$2.6 billion
Meta
Reported federal tax rate: 3.57%
Federal Tax breaks include
- R&D Expensing$12.6 billion
- Depreciation Deduction$4.9 billion
- R&D Credit$3.9 billion
- Stock Options$4.3 billion
Recent Filings
General Mills
Reported federal tax rate: 6.05%
Federal Tax breaks include
- R&D Expensing$265.7 million
- R&D Credit$17.5 million
MillerKnoll
Reported federal tax rate: -5.5%
Federal Tax breaks include
- FDII Deduction$1.9 million
- R&D Credit$4.7 million
Air Lease
Reported federal tax rate: 9.91%
Federal Tax breaks include
- Depreciation Deduction$233.1 million
- Interest Deduction Carryforward$28 million
Paychex
Reported federal tax rate: 14.73%
Federal Tax breaks include
- R&D Expensing$106.5 million
- Tax Credits$30.7 million
SS&C Technologies Holdings
Reported federal tax rate: 7.73%
Federal Tax breaks include
- Depreciation Deduction$118 million
- R&D Credit$22.8 million
- Stock Options$28.6 million
Chewy
Reported federal tax rate: 0.51%
Federal Tax breaks include
- Depreciation Deduction$14.4 million
- R&D Credit$27 million
- Stock Options$15.9 million
- Other Tax Credits$1.5 million
Companies are included here only if review of their 10-K filing for the 2025 fiscal year indicates that they avoided paying some amount of federal income taxes. Companies are counted as avoiding federal income tax if they are based in the US, reported a domestic pretax profit, and their federal ETR is less than the statutory 21%. Total tax avoided is the sum of the difference between the amount each company paid in federal income tax and 21% of their pretax profits. Individual tax reduction items are listed only for companies with a federal ETR below 15%.
Publications on Corporate Tax Avoidance (View All)
New Legislation Would Require Big Multinationals to Tell Shareholders Where They’re Hiding Offshore Profits
Sen. Chris Van Hollen introduced legislation requiring big multinational corporations to tell shareholders and the public what they’re already telling tax authorities behind closed doors: how much income they’re booking in specific offshore tax havens and how little tax they’re paying to these jurisdictions.
Trump Administration Says Shining Light on Corporate Tax Avoidance is ‘Very Dangerous’
Administration officials appear far more concerned about the public knowing too much about how U.S. corporations shift their income into offshore tax havens.
New EU Disclosure Requirements Are Helping Identify Corporate Tax Avoiders
Microsoft reports a huge share of its worldwide profit in low-tax Ireland and is achieving this despite having a very small share of its employees there. As other companies make similar disclosures between now and the end of calendar year 2026, investors and the public will likely get a much clearer sense of how much profit corporations are hiding offshore—and how much tax they’re avoiding by doing so.
Why Corporations Must Pay More
Corporate tax reforms could be more resilient than proposals to tax wealth or unrealized capital gains while achieving the same goal of more adequately taxing the income of billionaires.
The Final Frontier of Tax Avoidance: Elon Musk’s SpaceX Has $1.9 Billion to Gain from Defunding the IRS
A year after Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) cut a swath of destruction through vital federal agencies including the Internal Revenue Service, Musk’s apparent antipathy toward the IRS suddenly makes more sense.
Major Oil and Gas Corporations Pay Little in U.S. Tax
The oil and gas industry has long been known for widespread tax avoidance. Now, thanks to new disclosure rules, we have a better picture of how this occurs.
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