Wednesday, April 04, 2007

Pfizer's $35 million fine: Equivalent to a speeding ticket.

How much money is the $35 million criminal fine Pfizer was forced to pay this week for illegal marketing of Genotropin??

Last year Pfizer's profit was $11 billion.

But that profit doesn't include all the additional profit Pfizer is hiding in off-shore tax havens.

The New York Times in 2005 described a new tax break for corporations, part of the American Jobs Creation Act, signed into law by President Bush, which allowed companies a one-year window to return foreign profits to the United States at a 5.25 percent tax rate, compared with the standard 35 percent rate. The New York Times went on to state "Pfizer . . . will repatriate at least $28 billion under the act."

Obviously, the $11 billion profit is just a fraction of Pfizer's real profit, but let's use that number anyway.

$11 billion translates into nearly $35 million in profit EVERY DAY.

So the $35 million criminal fine was equivalent to one day's profit.

Let's put that in perspective: If you make $50,000 a year, that means you earn $137 every day. That is equivalent to a regular speeding ticket.

Did a speeding ticket ever stop you from speeding again?

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

How much money has Pfizer et al. made for making sure that the public does not know that advanced paternal age 33-35-40 and up causes a great deal of offspring with schizophrenia, prostate cancer,diabetes 1 and Alzheimer's,etc., the non-familial versions?

If the public knew the science wouldn't some men be willing not to father babies later in life, or might men possibly decide to make deposits, when they are 25-31 ish, in their own sperm bank accounts at cryobanks?

Does the industry promote the image of older men fathering babies as virile and worthy of emulation in the media?

http://www.schizophreniaforum.org/for/curr/Malaspina/default.asp

Is seems that healthy men in India are making use of cryobanks to insure their own fertility; and as an added bonus maybe having fewer offspring with autism, cancer,schizophrenia, diabetes 1, MS,cancers or Alzheimer's, etc.

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/NEWS/India/Young_men_freeze_family_plans/articleshow/1746622.cms

http://www.dnaindia.com/report.asp?newsid=1080597

. said...

Dear Dr. Rost,

I think your point is very valid and very relevent. I wonder, what is it going to take, before the average US citizen wakes up and gets... I don't know.. angry?

I think you deserve alot of credit, for calling this years ago.

Thanks again.

BK