Orlando Sentinel: Central Florida companies don’t pay fair share of state income taxes, report says
media mentionBy Sandra Pedicini, Orlando Sentinel
4:54 p.m. EST, December 7, 2011
Three Central Florida companies were named in a national report released Wednesday that contends many corporations pay too little in state income tax.
Darden Restaurants, Publix and Harris Corp. are “paying substantially less than what the tax rate would suggest they should be paying,” said Matthew Gardner, executive director of the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy, a nonprofit research group. It co-authored the report with Citizens for Tax Justice, an advocacy group backed by unions.
Both organizations have pushed for cracking down on corporate tax breaks and loopholes. Both allow companies to shield much of their profit from taxes, according to the report, “Corporate Tax Dodging in the 50 States.”
Nationwide, the average state corporate tax rate on company profits is 6.2 percent, and Florida’s is 5.5 percent. The 265 companies listed paid an average of 3 percent of profits in state taxes over three years.
Orlando-based Darden and Lakeland-based Publix both paid an average of 3.9 percent from 2008 to 2010, the report said. Melbourne-based Harris paid an average of 2.8 percent.
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Darden reported $1.6 billion in profits over the past three years, the report said, while Publix earned $5.5 billion, and Harris had $2.2 billion.
In an email, Darden said, “We believe we pay our fair share of taxes, and any study that discounts that may not have the complete picture. The company said it has created more than 3,000 jobs in Florida and more than 20,000 nationwide since 2008.
Publix said it takes deductions just as people do and gets tax breaks for things such as investing in communities and manufacturing in the United States.
A Harris spokesman said in an e-mail the rate in the report does not take into consideration the company’s international presence and tax rates for each region. Harris paid on average about 32 percent of its total income in federal, state and international income taxes, the company said.
Darden owns Olive Garden, Red Lobster and LongHorn Steakhouses among other dining chains. Publix has supermarkets around the Southeast, and Harris has operations in more than half a dozen states.
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