The MSM went bonkers last week trumpeting the record profits ExxonMobil earned last year. But as always, that’s only half the story. What you didn’t hear about were the record taxes ExxonMobil was paying. Emphasis mine.

While they were recording record profits last year, they were also writing checks to Uncle Sam to the tune of $100.7 billion — two and a half times what they made in net profit. In fact, previous Tax Foundation research found that from 1977 to 2004, federal and state governments extracted $397 billion by taxing the profits of the largest oil companies and an additional $1.1 trillion in taxes at the pump. In today’s dollars, that’s $2.2 trillion.

Surely paints an entirely different picture now, doesn’t it?

(via The Tax Foundation)