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Facebook paid £4,327 corporation tax in the UK in 2014

bbc.co.uk

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Re: Facebook paid £4,327 corporation tax in the UK in 2014

#21

Post by jkahn »

DanBC wrote: post #4

No-one expects companies to pay the full whack of tax. But Facebook is taking the piss. They need to be a bit careful, because they risk causing much tighter tax regulation in EU. Citizens don't see this behaviour and think "well done, got one over on the government". Most citizens are infuriated by this scumbag behaviour. And before anyone says "they're just obeying the law" -- we don't know that. They're clearly no…

They need to be a bit careful, because they risk causing much tighter tax regulation in EU.

I think this is going to happen anyway, as it's not just Facebook. Governments see it as a reduction in tax, and it's politically safe for a Government to do without getting voted out.

Re: Facebook paid £4,327 corporation tax in the UK in 2014

#22

Post by youngtaff »

maccard wrote: post #3

> Its most recent Companies House filing shows the company as making a pre-tax loss of £28.5m last year, but the firm also paid its 362 UK staff a total of £35.4m in share bonuses. So £35m was distributed as income towards the employees. This means the employees are paid extra, have more money to contribute and spend locally, and have paid the correct income taxes on the bonuses. How is this a bad thing?

Can't comment on the FB case but most share schemes are structured so the employee pays the minimum (if any) tax on the shares - typically by holding them for a number of years

Re: Facebook paid £4,327 corporation tax in the UK in 2014

#23

Post by gedrap »

I don't have a hope that this tax issue will be solved any time soon. There are hundreds of billions dollars involved globally, and when you are talking about that much money... It's very hard to do much about it, let's be realistic.

I quite agree about the attitude expressed here (Let's Just Give Up on Taxing Big Corporations, http://www.bloombergview.com/articles/2015-10-08/multination... ). It's not fair but there's not that much that can be done.

Re: Facebook paid £4,327 corporation tax in the UK in 2014

#24

Post by kybernetyk »

kauffj wrote: post #13
DanBC wrote: post #4

No-one expects companies to pay the full whack of tax. But Facebook is taking the piss. They need to be a bit careful, because they risk causing much tighter tax regulation in EU. Citizens don't see this behaviour and think "well done, got one over on the government". Most citizens are infuriated by this scumbag behaviour. And before anyone says "they're just obeying the law" -- we don't know that. They're clearly no…

I'm a citizen and I think that. Perhaps you describe most citizens, but certainly not all.

I run my own business here in Germany and I'm all for getting every penny out of every tax loophole possible.

But then in my peer group I'm the only one who thinks that way. Most people would rather want everyone else to be as highly taxed as themselves than lower taxes overall it seems.

Re: Facebook paid £4,327 corporation tax in the UK in 2014

#25

Post by Feoj »

DanBC wrote: post #11
radu_floricica wrote: post #5

Tech companies don't show profits as long as there's place for development. They're still paying tax on everything else, including renting offices, paying salaries and bonuses etc.

> paying salaries Isn't that a tax paid by the employee, not employer? Starbucks tried to say that they paid a lot in VAT, but that's a tax paid by the customer not the business.

In the UK employers have to pay a "National Insurance" Contribution on top of the employee's contribution.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Insurance

Re: Facebook paid £4,327 corporation tax in the UK in 2014

#26

Post by Marazan »

mrkmcknz wrote: post #18

The UK press seems to have a field day when it comes to multi-national corporations not paying corporation tax. We will no doubt shortly have a number of MPs telling us how unacceptable this is and that Facebook need to start paying up. This all irks me a little. 362 Facebook staff on an average salary of say £65,000 will contribute at least £7,230,696.60 in taxes and NI to HMRC. Let's also not pretend that £65,000 i…

If they hold them for 5 years there is no Cap Gains tax to be paid on the shares.

Arguing that the tax employees pay should be taken into account when calculating a companies tax provision lacks merit. That's employees tax not the companies - this is especially true for companies such as Starbucks where if they were not monopolising high street space by abusing the tax system and small local coffee shop would happily take their space in a fungible manner meaning the employee tax payments would still take place and there would be no net loss for Starbucks not existing.

Re: Facebook paid £4,327 corporation tax in the UK in 2014

#27

Post by bkor »

mrkmcknz wrote: post #18

The UK press seems to have a field day when it comes to multi-national corporations not paying corporation tax. We will no doubt shortly have a number of MPs telling us how unacceptable this is and that Facebook need to start paying up. This all irks me a little. 362 Facebook staff on an average salary of say £65,000 will contribute at least £7,230,696.60 in taxes and NI to HMRC. Let's also not pretend that £65,000 i…

That's why it has to be done across many countries so global companies cannot play one country against another. Your assumption that there are only two options doesn't apply.

Re: Facebook paid £4,327 corporation tax in the UK in 2014

#28

Post by squiggy22 »

DanBC wrote: post #4

No-one expects companies to pay the full whack of tax. But Facebook is taking the piss. They need to be a bit careful, because they risk causing much tighter tax regulation in EU. Citizens don't see this behaviour and think "well done, got one over on the government". Most citizens are infuriated by this scumbag behaviour. And before anyone says "they're just obeying the law" -- we don't know that. They're clearly no…

'some tax avoidance schemes haven't been tested in courts yet'

Probably because the law isn't either fit for purpose, or clear enough for someone to litigate.

As far as I'm concerned, if they (are obeying the law) and getting away with it, then articles like these only expose that the government are the incompetent ones.

Re: Facebook paid £4,327 corporation tax in the UK in 2014

#29

Post by Marazan »

3dfan wrote: post #9

What is the news here? FB was making a loss last year, so why should they pay corporation tax?

The UK subsidiary made a "loss" whilst paying out millions of bounds of stock bonuses. Either Facebook UK is the most incompetently manged company in the world orrrrrrr...

Re: Facebook paid £4,327 corporation tax in the UK in 2014

#30

Post by vidarh »

kuyfiuyg wrote: post #19

I'm asking someone who is more knowledgeable than me on this topic. What would happen if you replace all (most) tax with VAT? That would mean everywhere there is a real transaction, that generates greater value, that is where the tax is. It would also make it impossible for big companies to do tax evasion - since you limit the effects to the 'leaves' of the tree that is the economic system, you can catch the money be…

The issue with VAT is that as usually applied it is an extremely regressive tax. Poorer people spend a far higher proportion on their income on purchases that have VAT applied. If more categories of basic goods were zero-rated or exempt, or if other mechanisms were used to make the VAT burden less regressive, then it might be viable.
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