Behind Pfizer's bid for AstraZeneca - flee high US Corporate taxes

Pfizer's Tax Takeover - Spend $100 billion abroad rather than pay 40% at home.
Excerpt:

U.S. pharmaceutical giant Pfizer Inc. wants to buy AstraZeneca, and not just for its pipeline of cancer drugs. Acquiring the British company would also give Pfizer shareholders welcome relief from a U.S. corporate tax rate that is among the world's highest. Instead of paying punitive rates to return its money to the U.S., Pfizer figures it can get a better return paying $100 billion or so to buy a foreign company. .... Pfizer's presentation also noted the deal would be "structured to achieve an efficient tax structure." Mr. Read noted the "negative impact" of the U.S. tax code, which would be "problematical" if applied to the money AstraZeneca now earns in the U.K. That's because the combined state-federal corporate income tax rate in the U.S. is nearly 40%, compared to the 21% rate in the U.K. Though Pfizer is a U.S. company, more than 70% of its cash—amounting to more than $35 billion—is sitting overseas. To bring it back home would expose shareholders to the punitive U.S. rate. Instead, Pfizer aims to use some of that cash pile to finance the merger, and Mr. Read also plans to domicile the new combined holding company in the U.K., though its headquarters would remain in New York. Can anyone blame him? We call the U.S. business tax rate "among" the world's highest because, outside of places like North Korea that don't allow private business, it's nearly impossible to find a more punitive rate than the 40% inflicted in the U.S.

Comment: Secret .... corporations are not the ultimate payers of income taxes ... people are.