Whether you define it as "cost of production" is immaterial with respect to the requirement that the expense be paid.Whether it is an expense that must be paid is immaterial to the market price of a product.
Ah, but it is not at all immaterial as the example on hidden taxes clearly shows. Those taxes are embedded into the price of the product as it gets passed from one business to another. It is certainly not "immaterial" to the sales price of the product and as you surely know many businesses sell the same item for different prices. Trying to pretend that the costs of income taxes do not become part of the selling price is abject foolishness. Most people have sufficient common sense to realize that.
Preetending that all firms have to follow the same pricing structure and practice of a single leading firm is simply untrue. They may in some cases be required to be close to the "leaders" pricing structure, but in many cases they are not at all close but follow their own practices - otherwise Apple would sell their computers at prices just like those of the many sellers of Intel-based (or AMD-based) systems. There are more ways to set your company out from its competitors other than just price alone and in doing so you'd better cover the income tax costs that have been embedded in product costs.
You merely can't afford to admit the existence of the hidden taxes since it destroys the tenuously-help positions of you Status Quo Lovers.
Whether you define it as "cost of production" is immaterial with respect to the requirement that the expense be paid.Simply put, there is no tax expense on or of production....You can produce untill hell freezes over and never pay a tax.
The market sets a market price. My price may or may not be that price.
The reason? My expenses may be different than others' expenses... like I might have lower or higher TAX COSTS.
Keep it up, Forrest.