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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

#71

Post by nathanvanfleet »

smt88 wrote: post #34
jkahn wrote: post #12

Global companies offshoring profits and not paying enough tax (in the eyes of many countries) was a hot topic at the last G20 summit in Brisbane. This isn't limited to Facebook, as the article explains. The issue and background here is that when large companies operate globally, each country has its own local subsidiary, owned by the global entity. Money is made in each country by selling goods or services. How are t…

> provide the same level (or greater) services I don't agree with that in all cases, and I particularly don't agree related to Uber. When I lived in NYC, I often called "311" to complain about taxi-driver misconduct. This was the only outlet, and you really only did it because you wanted to feel better. There were never any direct consequences that you knew of. If you consider the decreased cost of operating the 311…

You have a lot of problems with your argument.

If you have a local taxi company, you make tax money from that company. If it's at least in your country, you make tax money from that company. If the support employees are in your city/country, you make tax money from those people.

So if the company is not from your country, and their support/offices/profits all go somewhere else, it's a loss for you (as a city or country) because before you got to make more money from the local taxi companies. Which you would hopefully use to pay for different services (not sure why you think 311 is the only conceivable cost here).

And honestly, you think rich people pay more taxes? Sorry, it's just not the case. 1 person making 100x more than an average person is going to pay less net taxes and will buy fewer things (even if it's more expensive stuff) than 100 people.

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

#72

Post by div »

kybernetyk wrote: post #24
kauffj wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

I think there's a lot more grey here than you're making out.

I'm all for minimising taxes within the legal framework, but that does not mean I agree with all the legal details.

In this particular case, there is something wrong with how large multinationals are able to avoid paying any taxes at all, it's a major problem in my country, Belgium, as well.

I don't agree with your last statement that people would rather want everyone else to be equally highly taxed than lower taxes overall.

I think people just want their tax legislation to be _fair_, and while that is definitely a fungible concept, these large multinationals are crossing the line for the majority of people.

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

#74

Post by smt88 »

jkahn wrote: post #45
smt88 wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> provide the same level (or greater) services I don't agree with that in all cases, and I particularly don't agree related to Uber. When I lived in NYC, I often called "311" to complain about taxi-driver misconduct. This was the only outlet, and you really only did it because you wanted to feel better. There were never any direct consequences that you knew of. If you consider the decreased cost of operating the 311…

That's not what I mean. I'm talking about what the tax money collected gets spent on by government - roads, healthcare, infrastructure, aged pensions. If industry X was paying $100mm tax, and industry Y disrupts and replaces that, while paying only $20mm tax, the government needs to find $80 million to replace that tax shortfall. Nothing to do with taxi related services...

And what I was saying is that industry Y might save the government money as well. The net effect might be that the government has more money.

To continue using Uber as an example, not only do they potentially decrease the costs of operating the government (see my reasoning above), they're also still paying local employees. Those employees will spend their Uber revenue and pay taxes, just as taxi drivers would.

Further, Uber makes it easier to move physical objects around in an economy. That should generally make the economy more efficient, which could also help to swing the balance in favor of a net positive effect.

All I was saying from the beginning is that it's not always true that an international company replacing local companies is creating a net decrease in government income.

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

#75

Post by mahouse »

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.

Then you are a bit selfish. Without taxes I don't know how you expect things to... work.

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

#76

Post by marbletiles »

[deleted] wrote: post #65
kybernetyk wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

[deleted]

> When people say they want higher taxes, they are almost always talking about higher taxes for everybody else than themselves.

No, they generally mean for everybody, in a fairly distributed way. Of course nobody is going to pay extra if they think that thereby they're subsidising a rich person who knowingly underpays.

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

#77

Post by exDM69 »

jkahn wrote: post #12

Global companies offshoring profits and not paying enough tax (in the eyes of many countries) was a hot topic at the last G20 summit in Brisbane. This isn't limited to Facebook, as the article explains. The issue and background here is that when large companies operate globally, each country has its own local subsidiary, owned by the global entity. Money is made in each country by selling goods or services. How are t…

Apple is a particularly difficult case, because they control every link in the chain of supply from manufacturing to retail and pay less than 1% effective corporate tax from their profits. From every step of the supply chain.

It is very difficult, if not impossible, to compete with Apple without having a similar end-to-end control of manufacturing to retail. If a company has to purchase their products from a manufacturer or sell their product to a 3rd party for retail, they are losing to Apple because that flow of money can't be hidden from the tax man.

Europe is currently facing major financial issues and a significant portion of this is that money gets funneled away to the US (or offshore accounts of US corps) without the fair share of taxes of their profits left here.

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

#78

Post by smt88 »

blowski wrote: post #69
smt88 wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> provide the same level (or greater) services I don't agree with that in all cases, and I particularly don't agree related to Uber. When I lived in NYC, I often called "311" to complain about taxi-driver misconduct. This was the only outlet, and you really only did it because you wanted to feel better. There were never any direct consequences that you knew of. If you consider the decreased cost of operating the 311…

Uber can only exist in a society with a detailed and rigorously applied legal code, decent transport infrastructure, and wealthy citizens. I'm sure there are more requirements. As Uber benefits from public spending on these things, they should also contribute to their upkeep.

> detailed and rigorously applied legal code

Not sure this one is a necessity. Uber is growing in China and India, and both of those places have legal systems and levels of corruption that shock those of us in the US learning about them for the first time.

I agree that Uber should contribute to the upkeep, but I was just doing an absolute comparison between Uber and taxi companies.

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

#79

Post by SmellyGeekBoy »

TomGullen wrote: post #17

TIL we pay 10-20x more corp tax than Facebook. Sometimes I feel like a fool, but we've always said from day 1 try to do things as honestly as possible which I'm quite proud of, but there really doesn't seem to be much practical upside apart from not being outed and shamed. First world problem I guess, at least we're turning a profit. It is starting to make me a bit bitter though. For example, we've spent a LOT of tim…

I'm a one-man-band and I paid about double the corporation tax Facebook did in 2014. My turnover isn't even high enough to register for VAT. Really makes you think!

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

#80

Post by smt88 »

nathanvanfleet wrote: post #71
smt88 wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> provide the same level (or greater) services I don't agree with that in all cases, and I particularly don't agree related to Uber. When I lived in NYC, I often called "311" to complain about taxi-driver misconduct. This was the only outlet, and you really only did it because you wanted to feel better. There were never any direct consequences that you knew of. If you consider the decreased cost of operating the 311…

You have a lot of problems with your argument. If you have a local taxi company, you make tax money from that company. If it's at least in your country, you make tax money from that company. If the support employees are in your city/country, you make tax money from those people. So if the company is not from your country, and their support/offices/profits all go somewhere else, it's a loss for you (as a city or count…

You have completely misunderstood everything I said.

I understand that tax revenue goes down when Uber replaces local taxi companies. I'm not arguing with that.

However, Uber can possibly decrease the costs of running the government (police, 311, and possibly others). We can't know for sure without specific numbers, but it's possible that Uber saves a government more money than it removes by avoiding taxes.

And I wasn't saying that rich people pay more taxes. I was saying that rich people using Uber is a redistribution of income, since the rider is almost always wealthier than the driver.

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