Paradise Papers: New leak from offshore finance firm • Hacker News Board

Re: Paradise Papers: New leak from offshore finance firm

#171

Post by vasilipupkin » Sun, Nov 05, 2017, 9:14 PM UTC

vonnik wrote: post #148

noobermin wrote: post #79

Since there are no top level comments putting this out for probably obvious reasons, here is a supportive comment for the article. This is what people feel in their guts when they drive out on tattered roads and avoid going to the hospital even though they are sick, when they don't have a real increase in wages but are working longer hours. They have the sense that something isn't right, that there are two sets of ru…

A friend of mine has been working on this same angle since Trump was elected. Politico covered his work in August: http://www.politico.com/story/2017/08/20/trump-bombshells-ro... His website is here: Weird money in, weird money out https://ragepath.org/weird-money-in-weird-money-out And below is his working hypothesis: We've documented Trump's relations with a variety of Soviet and Russian individuals and organizatio…

"But he borrowed 160 mln against the building"

This is where your argument collapses. The building dramatically increased in value - that's why he was able to borrow so much against it. That's the real estate game - and it's legit.

Re: Paradise Papers: New leak from offshore finance firm

#172

Post by croatoan » Sun, Nov 05, 2017, 9:14 PM UTC

What a crock of shit. Hilary Clinton, John Podesta, and Robert Mueller knowingly sold 20% of Americas HIGHLY ENRICHED URANIUM to Russia and Barack Obama knew about it. Its high treason that would have gotten each and every one of them executed just 30 years ago, but now the msm and the shills want to still say trump is tied to Russia.

Trump before the campaign has almost zero ties to Russia, and even if he did it's not illegal for a real-estate mogul to have ties with Russia. Trump after starting his campaign has had zero ties with Russia. ZERO. Comey,McCabe,Clapper,Brennon,Yates,Nunes,Fienstien,Schiff,Burr, and even Maxine "dead horse" Waters have stated on record multiple times, "There is absolutely no evidence of Russian collision with the trump campaign during the election." That's 2 FBI directors, a director of national intelligence, a CIA director, an assistant attorney general, 2 highest ranking senators on senate intel committee, 2 highest ranking congressman on house intel committee, and a dead horse all saying no Russian collusion.

Multiple CNN executives have said (hidden camera) that the entire Russian collusion that they pushed for 7-8 months is 100% a nothing burger. Wikileaks emails show that the dnc used the Russian collusion narrative as a smokescreen since day fucking 1. Seymour hersh, one of the most respected multi-pultzer prize winning journalists confirmed it was Seth rich, not Russia that gave Wikileaks the emails of the dnc. Julian Assange, the creator of wikileaks hinted at seth rich being the source for dnc leaks on many different occasions. Kimdotcom has evidence seth rich was the source of the dnc leaks through his supposed contact with seth before the dnc killed him. IT specialists mathematically proved that the dnc leaks could have only been downloaded through a USB connection, and that it was mathematically impossible for Russia to have hacked and downloaded the dnc leaks with current tech. Trump and Russia collusion is a complete and utter lie. Enough is a fucking enough, how long are shills gonna protect the lying scumbags from the fbi (mueller, comey, mccabe), the clinton crime family, and the podesta crime family?

Re: Paradise Papers: New leak from offshore finance firm

#173

Post by toyg » Sun, Nov 05, 2017, 9:14 PM UTC

SOLAR_FIELDS wrote: post #123

haaen wrote: post #103

Comment from economist Tyler Cowen when the same group of journalists released the Panama papers: Was it wrong to hack and leak the Panama Papers? Let’s say a group of criminal defense lawyers kept a database of their confidential conversations with their clients. That would include clients charged with murder, robbery, DUI, drug abuse, and so on. In turn, a hacker would break into that database and post the informat…

I would say this is a false equivocation to the extent that the "database" that the author referenced in beginning of the metaphor should not include victimless crimes such as "drug abuse". The author also assumes that there would be a de-facto backlash against the "hacker"'s behavior. I don't think so. If the justice system is "innocent until proven guilty", and these people are proven guilty in a court of law by ev…

> Do you as a citizen strive to minimize your tax burden to the most extent it makes sense and is legal?

The problem is that regular citizens do not have access to means of minimizing their taxes to the extent that the wealthy have. It's been shown over and over again that corporations and wealthy individuals can shrink their tax rates to be as low as 2%. Nobody else can get that low. That is the fundamental problem: that in practice there is a law for the rich and one for everybody else.

This is not unlike the sort of privileges European aristocracy used to enjoy up to the XVIII century. It took a number of violent uprising to change that state of things, let's hope it won't be necessary this time.

Re: Paradise Papers: New leak from offshore finance firm

#174

Post by mc32 » Sun, Nov 05, 2017, 9:15 PM UTC

nickbauman wrote: post #101

cisanti wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But corporations do like to paint themselves as moral and fighting for you! Another thing is why people believe in it... All in all, there are many things that are not illegal to do, but definitely immoral. Such tax schemes sure are immoral in my eyes, I'm a hard-core capitalist, but no way your average Joe stands a chance at "optimizing" taxes. People need to call out these companies more, but it's easy to deceive t…

The terms "capitalism" and for that matter "communism" are labels that have lost almost all meaning. The USSR was a dictatorship as is Russia today. "Capitalism" was a term coined by Karl Marx as a critique of 19th century industrial England. Calling yourself a "capitalist" is like calling yourself a "alienist". It's an archaic term and imprecise at best.

Terms and their meanings evolve over time to match usage.

Re: Paradise Papers: New leak from offshore finance firm

#175

Post by jacobolus » Sun, Nov 05, 2017, 9:15 PM UTC

haaen wrote: post #103

Comment from economist Tyler Cowen when the same group of journalists released the Panama papers: Was it wrong to hack and leak the Panama Papers? Let’s say a group of criminal defense lawyers kept a database of their confidential conversations with their clients. That would include clients charged with murder, robbery, DUI, drug abuse, and so on. In turn, a hacker would break into that database and post the informat…

Should we expect a right to “privacy” w/r/t a large-scale international conspiracy to support money laundering, tax evasion, bribery, embezzlement of poor countries’ budgets, illegal arms deals, and the like?

This seems substantially different than breaching attorney–client privilege. Unless the attorneys involved were actively helping their clients to plot ongoing or future crimes, in which case I say haul the bastards in.

There might be isolated rich people who did nothing strictly unethical or unlawful, and get caught up in scandal by the mere appearance of shady dealings. I can’t bring myself to feel too deeply sorry for them though. Nobody forced them to park their money in secret offshore banks famous for extralegal activity.

Re: Paradise Papers: New leak from offshore finance firm

#176

Post by closeparen » Sun, Nov 05, 2017, 9:16 PM UTC

wfo wrote: post #117

mrleiter wrote: post #33

It's the wrong angle. One should not look at corporations as the moral saviours. As Supreme Court Judge Learned Hand once said: "Over and over again courts have said that there is nothing 851*851 sinister in so arranging one's affairs as to keep taxes as low as possible. Everybody does so, rich or poor; and all do right, for nobody owes any public duty to pay more than the law demands: taxes are enforced exactions, n…

If we decide corporations have no obligation to be moral or decent, they naturally will behave as we expect. If we expect and demand (and punish the absence of) more, we can get more. Corporations are made up of people, and people are fully capable of not committing rampant constant fraud. Spending thousands of dollars to avoid their moral tax obligations instead of paying is in my view fraud and corruption; the fact…

Do you leave the standard deduction on the table? Because this is what you’re asking corporations to do: not take the opportunities to reduce tax liability that we provide them.

How about let’s raise taxes instead.

Re: Paradise Papers: New leak from offshore finance firm

#177

Post by forapurpose » Sun, Nov 05, 2017, 9:16 PM UTC

nickthemagicman wrote: post #89

My parents always taught me to be honest and care about those around you. The older I got the more I realized that was mal-adaptive behavior in capitalistic society. The real goal of capitalism is exploit or be exploited.

If we say, 'others are doing wrong; therefore I must do the same in order to compete', then we always will do wrong because there always will be people like that out there. If we say 'this system can be gamed by people willing to do bad things, therefore I must do them or I'm at a disadvantage', then we always will do bad things - every system is vulnerable.

Re: Paradise Papers: New leak from offshore finance firm

#178

Post by andrepd » Sun, Nov 05, 2017, 9:17 PM UTC

grondilu wrote: post #128

halfteatree wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How is this charity? Isn't "the poorest among us have some basic level of livelihood" exactly justice, and exactly the job of a government? Please don't use this kind of argument to turn HN into reddit.

In my humble opinion, the job of the government is absolutely not to give money to the poorest people, not even to maintain a "basic level of livelyhood". I'm also fairly certain this has nothing to do with the concept of justice.

Two things: it relieves me to see that you are in the minority with that kind of repellent thought. Second, I'm almost 100% sure that you would sing a very different tune if you had drawn the short stick in the birth lottery.

Re: Paradise Papers: New leak from offshore finance firm

#179

Post by Clubber » Sun, Nov 05, 2017, 9:17 PM UTC

mindcrime wrote: post #158

Clubber wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Taxation is theft to begin with How is taxation theft exactly?

Rather than repeat what's already been said many times before, I'll just refer you here: https://www.libertarianism.org/columns/is-taxation-theft

No one likes paying taxes but calling it theft is intellectually dishonest and hyperbolic that attempts to paint taxation as immoral for people who like to think emotionally rather than rationally.

I mean you happily use the services that taxes provide. Police, the legal system, roads, schools, libraries, anything created using the legal system, roads, schools or libraries, fuel exploration subsidies, research, etc. To use your hyperbolic analogy, using them without paying for them would be theft, therefore trying to mark taxation as immoral is trying to get out of paying for the services you use, which is in itself immoral and attempted theft.

Finally, if you don't like paying taxes that much, you have a couple of options: a. you can not make any money, or b. you can get a boat and live in international waters. Ironically, you would still be benefiting from services provided through taxation, namely sea lane protection from piracy provided by the US Navy, paid for with taxes.

Re: Paradise Papers: New leak from offshore finance firm

#180

Post by TeMPOraL » Sun, Nov 05, 2017, 9:17 PM UTC

pera wrote: post #77

mrleiter wrote: post #33

It's the wrong angle. One should not look at corporations as the moral saviours. As Supreme Court Judge Learned Hand once said: "Over and over again courts have said that there is nothing 851*851 sinister in so arranging one's affairs as to keep taxes as low as possible. Everybody does so, rich or poor; and all do right, for nobody owes any public duty to pay more than the law demands: taxes are enforced exactions, n…

"wrong angle"? :) sure, maybe we should focus on why only 0.001% of the population can play this pay-less-taxes-with-a-shell-corporation-in-a-tax-haven game...

Well, it's simple: the more effort you put at it, the better your results in this game. Effort == money (through using services of specialists), and so the more money you can spend on it, the more you can avoid taxes.

Sounds unfixable in general; the only thing you can adjust is severity of the phenomenon (e.g. less complexity in tax laws == less loopholes to exploit == cost/benefit curve on tax evasion grows slower).