The equipment only gets depreciated once but the tax is never paid. A farmer can buy a $250K tractor and write the whole thing off in one year. If he is hig income he can do that year after year until the tax code is changed. Thus on That $250K purchase he is getting an income tax savings of $100k or more. He may not need the income to function so he is in effect making a $100K investment in assets with tax payers picking up the tab.
Look at the dudes with hughe combines big tractors and 24 row planters and ask your self how big must the deficits get before we require those chaps to pay in each and every year they make money.
I dare say alot of those purchases are product of want rather than need. A farmer can probably buy a suitable pickup to service his need for $30K but instead he springs for aluxurious $50 k pickup and the taxpayer subsidizes that. And this permiates all through the business world with excesses being deducted at taxpayer expense.
BTW taxesa avoided or postponed are a huge benefit. Arguing that evenutally he will pay taxes on the income produced to pay for it. He should consider himself lucky to deduct depreciation as it occurs with out expecting to take it in advance.
Capital gains is the same way. Using money for decades to accumulate even more wealth and then getting a favorable rate when and if you liquidate. And avoiding it completely at your demise should your estate be small enough.
It isn't the assembly line workers that are lobbying for such provisions in the tax code. It's businees interests that want to rig the tax code to favor them. Tell me how a union worker can postpone his income tax obbligation for decades or longer.
