by William Lafferty » July 31, 2018, 11:17 am
I was told that the Huletts were only rented or leased to the operators and Hulett never sold the machines.
I find this on the surface hard to believe, at least for the early period when most Huletts were built. I cannot see a firm like United States Steel not owning outright its physical plant, especially since the rise of the Hulett coincided with the rise of accepted accounting methods for the depreciation of capital investment, a large tax savings for any corporation especially after the imposition of the first corporate income tax in 1909. What happens when the lease expires? Would, or could, Wellman-Seaver-Morgan take back the installations if a new lease could not be settled? As tax law has progressed, there have arisen certain financial advantages corporations can realize from leasing capital equipment and real estate which are prevalent today probably beginning with the railroad industry. That said, then, railroads had W-S-M build many Huletts, and railroads had been into leasing trackage and rolling stock since the late nineteenth century, at least, to conserve capital, so perhaps many, if not all, of the Huletts were leased at the railroads' insistence initially.
[quote] I was told that the Huletts were only rented or leased to the operators and Hulett never sold the machines.[/quote]
I find this on the surface hard to believe, at least for the early period when most Huletts were built. I cannot see a firm like United States Steel not owning outright its physical plant, especially since the rise of the Hulett coincided with the rise of accepted accounting methods for the depreciation of capital investment, a large tax savings for any corporation especially after the imposition of the first corporate income tax in 1909. What happens when the lease expires? Would, or could, Wellman-Seaver-Morgan take back the installations if a new lease could not be settled? As tax law has progressed, there have arisen certain financial advantages corporations can realize from leasing capital equipment and real estate which are prevalent today probably beginning with the railroad industry. That said, then, railroads had W-S-M build many Huletts, and railroads had been into leasing trackage and rolling stock since the late nineteenth century, at least, to conserve capital, so perhaps many, if not all, of the Huletts were leased at the railroads' insistence initially.