I'm sure I just got hit by a not-so-new idea: to tax corporations on profit-per-employee basis. Automation tax, efficiency tax. Imagine the discourse!

To add to that - they essentially appropriate taxes workers pay as their own taxes - as if they owned the work that worker put their life into. This is insanely evil.

No. They appropriate the employment taxes that they themselves are paying. Most folks aren't aware that employees in the US only pay half of the income tax for their employment. The company pays the other half. And those taxes usually aren't counted in these dramatic "blah company paid zero taxes" headlines. They also usually don't include real property taxes, sales taxes, etc.

Also to note, the US (now) has somewhat competitive corporate tax rates compared to its peer countries. However, most countries have a lower (or much lower) corporate tax rate than the US has. We shouldn't be comparing corporate tax rates with personal income tax rates... we should be comparing corporate tax rates amongst similar countries.

The lack of understanding of the tax rules by folks writing these dramatic headlines is really irritating.

Isn't an employment contract a worker entering an agreement to give work to an employer? Why is it evil for a corporation to own the work a worker is paid to do?

I am sorry, I probably didn't word it too well. My point is that corporation may say that the tax a worker pays is actually their tax and they use that to justify why they pay next to no tax themselves. For example it is said that Amazon pays little tax in comparison to their profits and politicians use the argument that Amazon provide jobs and the workers pays tax, as if it was the Amazon who pays those taxes. Shifting the blame on the victim. One reason that workers pay so much tax is because corporations don't. Corporations then enjoy multi billion profits and workers barely can get by.