I am on social security and own a corporation....

....I see the entire idea of corporations being beaten up on this site...and sure, a lot of them deserve beating.Actually I own 75% of a corporation that will (hopefully) be serving hot dogs next year. So I find myself in the unenviable position of defending corporations...for tax reasons it will be advantageous to structure the business in this way. Also if I should catch a bad batch of hot dogs, (read: food poisoning) they will kill my business, but I will still be able to live in my double wide...I have a separate entity known aS an "LLC" that owns the cooking equipment...In short, would you sell a plate of your "secret recipe" knowing that the downside of every sale was a loss of everything you owned???There is a place for corporations, but giving them legal standing as a human being is wrong....

makes it even more wrong...

Marginal annotations on the record of Santa Clara v Southern Pacific.

corporations is so far beyond me I can't make any intelligent contribution to the discussion. But I'll jump in because I am stuck at home with a lousy cold and bored.

Good luck with your hot dogs. I LOVE hot dogs. Make sure you have kraut and chopped onions.

they don't eat that part of the dog. J Smirnov

that Florida is regularly mentioned as the WORST state in terms of hot dogs.....you may have Disney but need help in terms of real dogs,fried onions,and your chili really bites it....

...if ANYONE ever produces a decent dog in your state they will make millions....(when mom 77 and dad 79 finally pass and sever my last connection to New England I'm heading down there with a pot of chili...)

business conglomerates when we beat up on corporations.

The family farm is usually a Corp. too, but it is not what is fucking life on this planet.

entrepreneurship is a good thing. corporate welfare that privatizes profits while socializing risks is bad.

the original intent of a corporation was to do exactly what you are doing. the idea is to encourage innovation and enterprise, allowing you to have up and down risk, but limitting your down risk to your actual investment (i.e., protecting your personal assets) in order to enourage legitimate innovation.

however, this is subject to abuse. for instance, were you to embark on a venture where you KNOW you will evantually cause someone outsized damages (i.e., net-net, you are producing financial reward but negative economic value -- obviously i would hope this is not your intent!) then it is totally bogus for you to take advantage of the asset protections that incorporating offers. the person or persons you end up damaging will be deprived of just compensation, while you preserve your assets and keep your salary you 'earned' until you got caught.

this is just one example of the potential for abuse. moreover, it's usually BIG corporations that people actually despise, and the fact that their technically incorporated actually isn't always relevant. large and corrupt and/or evil is.

i don't think most people here think corporations in and of themselves are automatically, unredeemably evil. it's just that there are so many examples of abuse out there....

..a great post and SO cogent to the discussion!This is exactly the kind of discussion I was trying to provoke....Thanks..

The problem creeps up on you, when you hire outside employees. Suddenly, your
"commands" to those employees, in this case, to make burgers, seem reasonable
enough. Then you (not really *you* ) insist on extensive background checks and
interviews of a person's family, credit reports and a drugs pee and hair test
in order to keep making burgers at your outlet.

And suddenly, the corporation is at odds with the 4th amendment. This, in a
short allegory, encapsulates the conundrum of the divine will of kings that
fuels the benign corporate director... and yet, in any effort at enslaving
others, the reality has proven over and over, that constitutional rights
stop at the door to your private dictatorship.

upon you.

A corporation can't force them upon you either. But you can choose of your own volition to take drug tests, submit to credit reports, etc if you're interested in employment by the corporation.

co-worker b/c you're protected from the actions of your employer by the First Amendment.

If we have hate speech laws in our society, then they should apply universally,
and i don't agree that a person should lose their job, but rather "have" to
keep the person whilst they did 1000 hours of community service.

I view the rights, and the establishment of those rights in the world as the
objective of government. Perhaps i'm whacked about that.

It is the right of a person who is wrongly poisoned through the neglect
of a food service operator, to pursue justice. Yet it is the right of a
person to set up 1000 websites saying that the food service outlet serves
dodgey food; swiftboating if you will.

Then the human right to reputation is impugned by the right to free speech,
and they are at odds, something that creates a crisis of truth, where all
moral poles are equal, there is no "right" truth, postmodern truth, is how
many papers are published on a subject, the ontology of the budget allocation
spreadsheets of their masters.

Corporations violate the civil rights of our society willingly, and i don't
agree that they have any such right. The jurisdiction of the courts, the
law and outside justice needs to shine in the offices of most corporations.
These entities are above the state, above freedom of information, above
any single tax law regimen, limited only by the pocketbooks of their financiers.
These things are not above the law, and if it turns out that
bush's few thousand wire taps were on the few thousand world largest
corporatsions, i might forgive him.

the small corporation by the large insurance corporations in the guise of "reduced" insurance to the corporation. I have successfully defended our company against the mandatory drug testing (I am not the police.) Good thing I am at the end of my career, not the beginning. God help the future entrepreneurs. Their heart and soul and company will belong to the "piece of the rock."

neighborhood hotdog stand. If you want to work there, you volontarily submit to these things, drug tests, credit reports, ect... It's their perogative to ask. You don't have to work there. But the 4th amendment, remember, doesn't apply to private companies or individuals. They have to follow the law; it doesn't give them permission to search your home....

Then the free choice to not be tested is effectively denied and
the reality is that we are subject to no choice but an involuntary search.

You don't have to work, I guess. And three aer plenty of jobs that don't drug test. And, maybe, you could stop using drugs......

There is no such thing as economics without political overtones.

You are ultimately right, which is why *I* left the country, not because
i love travel as much as i love keeping my civil rights and the
connection between the two words "political-economy".

multinational corps with subsidairy companies in semi related industries that allow them a de-facto monopoly over a good or a service, or that aren't good corporate citizens, either by virtue of size or corporate ethos, i have no use for and they need to be highly regulated and taxed at a fair amount. and *corporate personhood* should end yesterday. so i agree with ya.;)

I'm tired of big companies bullying state and local governments for subsidies and tax breaks that screw the citizens and DON'T really keep jobs in the region, or in the U.S. for that matter, despite claims to the contrary. And I work for one of those companies, as do many of us. It needs to stop.

State and local governments do not have to give companies tax breaks. Like you said all it does is screw the taxpayers and they figure out a way to get the job done elsewhere.

It is high time that local and state governments tell the corporations to go screw their self. Until local and state governments get some nads the corporations are just going to keep screwing them.

:-)

same as larger corporations like Enron who peddle political influence and raid their employees' pension funds.

Publicly traded corporations even operate (tax-wise and otherwise) differently than closely-held non-publicly traded corporations (like yours).

I don't think the people here at DU are complaining about small family-busines type of corporations because they aren't the problem anyway.

...so let me comment further..my corporation has at it's heart, a charter that says the corporation is formed to provide "mobile food services " and is held jointly by myself and a family member.The corporation exists solely to provide this service...My LLC holds and owns ALL the equipment to provide this service (ie: a trailer and a large amount of commercial kitchen equipment) which it leases to my corporation.In the case of a tort suit, my maximum damage should be limited to the operating corporation, which owns nothing...likewise, the LLC provides equipment but has no exposure to legal tort...If corporation A were to accidentally food poison 100 people, My corporation would be bust, but supposedly I would lose neither a paper plate nor my means of doing business....if it happened Tuesday, I could theoretically form a new corporation Wednesday (though my attorney says the paperwork might take several weeks) and head out from there...As a sane person,I would be crazy not to avail myself of these protections, but as a DU member, how do you feel???

so that you won't be held liable?

If not, you're OK in my book. :)

Ketchup and relish please!

other people all the time - from getting them to do something to getting money out of them.

To incorporate is a needed investment and a proper investment in doing business.

Now if you start charging all living expenses to the corporation - the way many do - I may well get upset. But it will be that act - and not the act of incorporation - that will annoy

I don't think people ought to be able to hide illegal, particularly deadly, activity behind a corporate front. In fact they can't completely, which is why we have these Enron and Global Crossing and Tyco people in jail. But what they can do, which ought to be changed, is go right into another corporation when they get out of jail. That needs to be changed. It's one thing to limit personal liability, it's another to be able to start and fold corporations to either escape debt or wrong doing.

....as a food nut I feed lots of folks at home...What I AM trying to do is build a liability shield to keep my home should the worst case occur...illegal and deadly??? I just want to serve a good dog....and yes,I believe if I were to deceive stockholders I would deserve jail time...which part of this don't you get? I live in a doublewide in New Hampshire on social security...Just trying to get by Bro....

"...If corporation A were to accidentally food poison 100 people, My corporation would be bust, but supposedly I would lose neither a paper plate nor my means of doing business....if it happened Tuesday, I could theoretically form a new corporation Wednesday"

If you accidentally poisoned a bunch of people, probably nothing would happen anyway. That can happen to any food business... once. If it happened often enough to become a financial liability, then no, you shouldn't get to close on Tuesday and open again on Wednesday.

everyone and everything in their path is another!!! :grr:

Just don't pull the crap big business does and you will be fine. Have a great product, have integrity, be kind to the earth, don't be greedy and pay your employees a decent wage while treating em with respect.

That's ALL any of us who vent about big businesses or corporations are saying!

Small ones aren't a concern.

There's a big difference.

business owner, so if the business fails, the owners don't lose everything they own in the private sector. As a matter-of-fact, I think the government should help these mom and pop enterprises to survive with affordable insurance and other venues like competitive wholesale prices for stock. It gives people a chance to improve their lot and these small business employ more than half the work force.

However, these businesses who actually need government programs to help them stay in business and compete witht he WalMarts and other behemouths don't get hardly any assistance at all.

...except I intend to screw you AND the system to a degree.The corporation will owe a heavy capital debt to the LLC,which it must repay with interest...after labor and capital costs, I expect that puppy will lose money for three or four years...the LLC will regain its capital investment PLUS interest and then will merely exist to lease equipment to the corporation at a slightly inflated price PLUS interest, thereby keeping the corporation in debt while building salable assets...in the end the ONLY taxes I expect to pay will be on the final sale in ten years or so...and legal advice says that should be no problem....

though together, they could make a difference.

My trouble is with the gigunda MegaCorps who get away with murder.

Why do members of the Right Wing blabber and blather and blubber away about "taking responsibility for one's mistakes" when it comes to the citizen, yet do all in their power to keep huge corporations from taking responsibility for their mistakes?

Why do they remove the safety net for the citizen only to place that same net squarely under the asses of the multinationals, the pharm companies, and the automakers?

Why would a government OF THE PEOPLE, BY THE PEOPLE, and FOR THE PEOPLE abandon the people for the corporation? What sense is there in this policy except short-term gain and long-term collapse?

If friends came to your home and were served hot dogs and beer while watching football, and three children died of food poisoning, you could probably tap your homeowner's insurance for coverage against liability.

Let's talk about "accidents." In all of the states in which I've lived, I've been required to carry insurance to drive a car - including liability insurance in particular. What kind of sense does it make to allow someone doing food business with the public to escape liability (even for an 'accident') when we don't even allow drivers on the roads without liability insurance?

How would you feel if it were your children or your wife that died of 'accidental' food poisoning from a business such as yours?

Like most liberals, I'm not out to 'grandfather' people who've played by the rules, even if those rules were egregiously screwed up. I'm out to change the system to ensure "liberty and justice for all" ... including economic justice.

I will have liability insurance,tho I think half a mil will cover it here.Please add your comments regarding the general ethics of my case...I appreciate all comments here...including would you structure it this way and is burying cash past income taxes fair???

off the books and not recording all sales is what is meant, that is illegal. If doing a bit of barter, that is at least a little gray (but still mostly black as to law). If taking cash from the till, such "expense" must be documented.

If the question is ethics, seeing myself as having a righteous man status is more important than anything else. For me screwing around is not worth the head pain.

If you mean chasing tax shelters via your corporation, there is absolutely no ethics problem in doing so.

All of the above, of course, is IMHO.

:-)

...each and every cup of coffee will be recorded.I just like the fact that every nickle I have put into this puppy will be legally repaid plus I will write off the costs of forming both companies....

pension advice or other tax shelter/employee benefit advice drop me a message and I will either do the consult myself or point you to folks in your area (actually point you to directory and internet wording with which you can pull up folks in your area - or to organizations that have members that can help).

you are bookmarked and note......

please explain

That's the real problem. That and giving corporations the rights of American citizens without the responsibilities and accountability.

Buying the government?...here's how I intend it to go down....I have an operating corporation and an LLC to lease the equipment...the corporation cost about 5K and the LLC about 20K in investment...this is cash from my pocket.Since in the bank it means 2-3% then anything I can make over that is gravy...I intend to make a nice lunch ....as a corporation I also intend to make profits.Now as a guy on social security, it will be nice to have several free meals a day as a quality control and tax deductible method.The fact that my car will haul rolls,burgers and dogs to the trailer makes a percentage of that tax deductible,and the fact I will work reporting documents at home will make a portion of my home tax deductible...I don't make the rules but I would be a fool not to avail myself of them...in short I intend to be a good corporate citizen,but a corporation all the same.......

but think about this...

Business costs can be broadly assigned to 2 categories, fixed and variable.

In your case, variable costs would be the wieners, buns, mustard relish, the actual costs to make the hot dog. Now these costs are more or less fixed on a per hot dog basis, lets say just for example 50¢.
So if you sell the dog for say $1.50 ya have a buck profit per dog, then if you sell a hundred ya make a $100. Not too shabby, plus there is no minimum sale needed to make a profit.

But look what happens when you figure in the 'fixed' costs. There is the business license plus the all important health department inspections etc. In some communities these costs can be quite high and to overcome them can push the minimum sales needed to cross the profit point into a zone where you have to run faster and faster to just keep even.

Let me give you an example. I went to a museum here a couple of years back. After looking at Van Gogh's "Starry Night", leaving the museum I spotted a hot dog stand parked on the sidewalk out front and got dogs and cokes for me and the missus. I paid like $13 for 2 dogs and cokes. I though wow, these suckers are expensive. It was slow so I struck-up a conversation with the guy running the stand. What he told me is he just barely breaks even with the stand and his main money maker was a catering service he advertises on the side of the van. It seems that between the health department inspection and licensing costs, the costs he pays to the museum (for the right to park) the periodic under the table cash payments to the widows and orphans fund the police demand, he needed to sell about 300 dogs per hour for the 3 hours he was allowed to park in front of the museum to just cross-over into the profit zone. And that was with charging $5/dog.

These municipalities gouge private businesses mercilessly primarily because they can. These 'hidden fixed costs can take a good money maker and turn it into a loser. The parasites in this world flock to positions where there can get a piece of somebody else's work, for providing absolutely nothing.

Our society, IMHO, has what I call a parasitic overhead approaching 60% on every business venture. The parasites are not the supposed recipients of the various additional fixed costs that are leveed on the businesses, they are primarily the fat cats siphoning money into their own bank accounts. I remember in the movie "Popeye" when he docked his boat, there was this mealy looking guy collecting all sorts of fees for the 'Commodore', thats what doing business in America reminds me of.

Anyway, good luck on your venture, I wouldn't hold it against you if you figured out a way to work your business 'off the books' on an all cash foundation. Many do, out of necessity. It's not to cheat society that people do this, it's because society is so corrupt that to exist, people have to become corrupt themselves.

This world sucks.

It can directly effect your SS

IMHO