Facebook paid £4,327 corporation tax in the UK in 2014 • Hacker News Board

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

#301

Post by saiya-jin » Mon, Oct 12, 2015, 3:08 PM UTC

catshirt wrote: post #248

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…

it's misguided to call tax practices like these dishonest because it puts the blame on Facebook, who is operating legally in the system they are provided. the alternative is that they knowingly pay more tax than the law requires of them. which is ridiculous. don't hate the player, as they say...

this is true in scenario where these massive corporations are just passive bystanders, obediently following all new tax laws that come up daily. the reality is, through networks of lobbyists, they put forth laws with loopholes that allow these practices.

i am not accusing facebook specifically, any and all multinationals are guilty in a similar way, be it banks, procter&gamble or newest computer fad beyond-startup company.

and of course there is the moral aspect - everybody can see from raw numbers how utterly immoral behavior this is. in a world where financial crisis didn't end as much as it became new norm.

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

#302

Post by crazy1van » Mon, Oct 12, 2015, 3:10 PM UTC

funkyy wrote: post #272

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…

Simple 1% revenue tax on companies with revenue of more than $15 million would fix the issue. No other taxes, just revenue one, no tax credits, no refunds. No hiding costs, no going offshore, no creative accounting. One tax on all revenues that will hit your account. This would also help to cut out all the middle man driving prices up and make the logistic chain quite small. Some countries want to experiment with thi…

> Simple 1% revenue tax on companies with revenue of more than $15 million would fix the issue.

What country can levy this tax? Large companies like Apple have operations in lots of countries. Do they have to pay each one 1% of their raw revenue?

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

#303

Post by kuschku » Mon, Oct 12, 2015, 3:11 PM UTC

phlo wrote: post #273

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…

Stories like this make me question if corporate tax even makes sense. However well designed, a tax code with today's complexities is going to have holes. If a savings of even one per mill may mean millions, corporations are going to spend insane amounts of money to hire the best experts to use every last loophole. Why don't we cut down everything to a couple of manageable groups that can be tightened down? I think th…

So, in your system, how would a corporations profits be taxed? You have shown nothing like that, really.

And a direct property tax is also not a good idea, as then you tax people for having property, not for using their property.

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

#304

Post by Marazan » Mon, Oct 12, 2015, 3:12 PM UTC

refurb wrote: post #293

Marazan wrote: post #268

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, what they are doing is pointing out that just because something is legal does not make it moral.

Moral to who? Are you suggesting we legislate morality? I'd prefer not to go down that path (again).

We legislate morality all the time.

Would you at least agree with the statement that "Not all legal actions are moral and not all moral actions are legal"?

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

#305

Post by robk » Mon, Oct 12, 2015, 3:12 PM UTC

switch007 wrote: post #35

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…

> 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 not pretend all 362 Facebook staff are paying tax via PAYE.

I'd be happy to pretend that. Most of Facebook UK staff are actually employed here as high value employees (engineers, sales). I'd be very surprised if there were many contractors here in the UK.

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

#306

Post by SmellyGeekBoy » Mon, Oct 12, 2015, 3:17 PM UTC

phillc73 wrote: post #131

SmellyGeekBoy wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thanks for the advice. I was pretty close to the threshold last year and it's looking likely I'll have to register this year so I'll certainly look into it. I'm actually between accountants at the moment, although HMRC's own PAYE RTI app at least makes that side of things ridiculously easy for me. I certainly wasn't looking forward to dealing with VAT on my own.

When I started my UK Limited company I immediately registered for VAT, so I could claim VAT paid on purchased startup equipment, which was mostly computing goods. I could then obviously offset that against VAT collected in the first months of business. I quickly discovered that quarterly VAT returns were a pain, and accountants aren't cheap (for some definition of cheap). I am also just a one man band at the moment,…

I was told not to register by my old accountant, it was one of the few pieces of good advice he gave me. ;)

I know of a few contractors who registered so they could claim back 20% on a new TV, new iPhone, top of the range gaming PC... Perhaps I'm just too honest but I already had everything I needed (a high end laptop) and didn't like the thought of the extra hassle. Not just the day-to-day bookkeeping side of things (I use Sage anyway) but keeping up with the changes in allowances and thresholds and remembering to submit the quarterly returns. I'd rather just get on with my job!

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

#307

Post by kuschku » Mon, Oct 12, 2015, 3:17 PM UTC

smt88 wrote: post #74

jkahn wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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. Furthe…

Uber is in every way reducing tax income.

Old model: The taxi company spends 100% of its income in the state, meaning the state collects 100% of the taxes of the costs.

Uber model: Uber spends next to nothing in the state, so the state gets less.

Uber still uses the same governmental resources, uber drivers earn less than the taxi drivers (less income, less taxes), and have less money to spend (economy shrinks, less taxes).

Uber makes the economy less efficient, as more money ends up in the US than in local businesses.

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

#308

Post by evanpw » Mon, Oct 12, 2015, 3:17 PM UTC

So...the employees likely pay a larger amount in income taxes than Facebook would have paid in corporate taxes, and the remainder goes to the actual UK employees rather than shareholders in the US. Isn't this the best possible outcome for the UK? Is this article just pure mood affiliation (greedy corporations!), or is there something I'm missing?

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

#309

Post by kuschku » Mon, Oct 12, 2015, 3:18 PM UTC

smt88 wrote: post #78

blowski wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

Eh, look at Germany: We had like 5 or 6 different uber-like businesses already competing before uber even was a thing.

The only reason uber even ever made profit in some German cities was by refusing to buy insurance and thereby being cheaper than the competitors.

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

#310

Post by SmellyGeekBoy » Mon, Oct 12, 2015, 3:19 PM UTC

boothead wrote: post #157

SmellyGeekBoy wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thanks for the advice. I was pretty close to the threshold last year and it's looking likely I'll have to register this year so I'll certainly look into it. I'm actually between accountants at the moment, although HMRC's own PAYE RTI app at least makes that side of things ridiculously easy for me. I certainly wasn't looking forward to dealing with VAT on my own.

Freeagent also deals quite nicely with VAT, and you can set up for automatic direct debit... In fact I sometimes wonder what I'm paying my accountant > £100/month for :-)

First I've heard of FreeAgent. I've had Xero recommended to me by others in the same boat, and I personally use Wave just for invoicing (as it doesn't cost me anything and at least help me keep track of whether I've been paid).