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Comment by thebmax | Hacker News Reader

This is most likely a tax play. Renewable energy projects are almost always financed through tax incentives that can be used to offset tax liabilities elsewhere. Could be seen as hypocritical of Buffet considering his recent musings that rich people should pay their fair share. Here he is trying to avoid taxes.

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First of all, he's not personally buying it, so it's not like this would reduce his personal taxes. Secondly, your first sentence is clearly speculative, but then you act as if it's definitely true for the rest of your comment - do you have any evidence for this whatsoever?

You are correct. Berkshire Hathaway would benefit, not him personally. The tax credits are a big reason these things get built. There is a 30% solar tax credit that can be passed through to owners against other income.

http://www.dsireusa.org/incentives/incentive.cfm?Incentive_C...

The reason this may not be a tax play for him is that ConEdison or SunPower may have already stripped the tax credits from the project and sold them independently. This means there may only be a long term investment vehicle that insurance-type companies like to hold. But someone benefited from the tax credits and I wouldn't be surprised if they were part of the deal.

According to your link, the tax credit is only available to the original installer of the solar facility, i.e., the solar plant in this case. In order to take advantage of the creditk, the solar plant company would have to file a consolidated return with Berkshire Hathaway.

I don't think it is because Buffet is all about making long term investments. Tax incentives that will go out of fashion at some point (probably in next 10 years) wouldn't impact his decision as much as sound business fundamentals and future potential.

However, even if it is a tax play, it's not inconsistent with his POV that the rich should pay their fair share. You can believe that the rules are currently broken, yet play by the current rules. One is about what you believe to be fair and the latter is about what is in the best interest of your shareholders.

If this is hypocritical, so is paying the lower tax rate than his secretary, even thought he complains about it. Anyone thinking its hypocritical is missing the point. He does it to show it exists. Sure, you can not do it, and donate to the government on your own, but that's not fixing the problem. The small number of donators can't fix the deficit on their own. It takes a law that required everyone to play ball in order to fix the problem.

He meant other rich people should pay their fair share, of course.

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