Don't Fall for AT&T's Billion-Dollar Swindle

AT&T is promising to spend an additional billion dollars in 2018 if Congress slashes its tax bill for the next 10 years or more, and the company isn’t making any promises beyond that. This extra billion in investment would cost the rest of us at least $50 billion over the next decade. That’s a literal steal for AT&T and its shareholders. Put another way: For the $50 billion this corporate tax break would cost us for AT&T alone, the government could pay to have fiber-to-the-home built to every single AT&T-covered household that doesn’t yet have it. The fact is that AT&T’s alleged public largesse is just the company patting itself on the back for doing what any of its competitors would do: investing as little as possible to maximize its profits. What makes this even more egregious is that AT&T’s tax lobbying completely contradicts the false claims it makes about Net Neutrality rules harming investment. No less an authority than AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson said that this corporate tax cut is the only thing “that will get that investment trend turned” around in the short term. If AT&T gets its way on Net Neutrality and taxes, don’t be surprised when it comes back asking government for more special favors, claiming yet again that investment will suffer if the company doesn’t get whatever it wants.