161–170 of 817 posts
Create a business which behaves and acts the same way as Appleby but for small enterprise of lets say 30k revenues a year only. You provide the service on a almost non profitable way to attract the vast majority of enterprises in this revenue sector. Ultimately, governments will see the effect of lost taxes and act accordingly.
Dear Herr Krach, thank you for your letter. I think you misunderstand how business works. Apple is a profit seeking corporation. Profits we make, we hope to distribute to our shareholders. Paying taxes is an obligation with which we comply, both to the letter and in spirit. We meet such obligations, but not nilly-willy. Our shareholders would not look kindly upon executives who pay more taxes than necessary. Avoidanc…
I'm not sure what your argument is. Is it (a) that tax avoidance is morally justified, (b) morally justified only in the business context or (c) not of concern, because the business and the moral are two separate contexts?
Tax avoidance within the bounds of the law is not just morally justified - it's morally required.
(For the record, I think tax avoidance is a major problem, especially because large corporations end up being the only ones who can afford the accountants, lawyers, and international subsidiaries to facilitate it. Small business ends up getting shafted. But the way to solve it isn't to whine about Apple doing what Apple is supposed to do. The fix is to reform the tax code.)
What annoys me the most is that, as a small company, I can't evade from my country tax system. I pay the taxes. All of them, at full rate. But there are these big companies which can afford to create offshore companies/holding just to evade some tax system, and lower their tax rate. So, what? The tax rate of a country is now "artificial", because it will never be applied to all revenues from all companies, because th…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
What's to be done about it? We're the ants. That depressing truth has a way of manifesting. I'm not quite sure what to feel about it. Our attempts here are futile. We're not going to get any legislation passed. The fact is, companies can opt out of the social contract. They are big, and they're going to play by different rules. But I don't think that's strange -- that's just life. It happens in China and Russia. Why…
You can still live with choosing to not buy any iphone or mac book stuff.
Unfortunately, that's not really a tenable position for many users here.
What annoys me the most is that, as a small company, I can't evade from my country tax system. I pay the taxes. All of them, at full rate. But there are these big companies which can afford to create offshore companies/holding just to evade some tax system, and lower their tax rate. So, what? The tax rate of a country is now "artificial", because it will never be applied to all revenues from all companies, because th…
Apple do pay their taxes just like you for everything they sell in the US. It's what they sell outside of the US that they don't pay, but they do pay in those other countries. The biggest unfair advantage they have against you is if you sell to overseas markets (you're paying US tax, not them) but if your market is US only then Apple isn't paying less than you are.
On thing I wonder about all these proponents for Apple to voluntarily pay more taxes: do they themselves pay more taxes than strictly required of them? I mean do they not take advantage of that child exemption? Do they not deduce that mortgage? Those medical costs? That college tuition? Those business expenses? Do they decide to voluntarily add at least 1% to their income tax bracket? Do they practice what they preac…
What annoys me the most is that, as a small company, I can't evade from my country tax system. I pay the taxes. All of them, at full rate. But there are these big companies which can afford to create offshore companies/holding just to evade some tax system, and lower their tax rate. So, what? The tax rate of a country is now "artificial", because it will never be applied to all revenues from all companies, because th…
All they are doing is arbitraging loopholes in the tax systems. Politicians have been trying to solve way too many problems by taxes (taxing differently x and y) or giving tax gifts to donors and various organised interests. As a result it creates an arbitrage-able tax system. I wouldn't point your annoyance to those who are optimising their taxes (after all this is merely their fiduciary duties to their share holder…
Land value tax works even better: it's physically impossible to move or hide land.
The point about Apple hiring best graduates who got their education mostly free of charge cause of all the tax payers really shift my mind about the whole tax-avoidance thing.
> The point about Apple hiring best graduates who got their education mostly free of charge cause of all the tax payers really shift my mind about the whole tax-avoidance thing. Yes, that's true, but another angle is, that when the corporation profits are very high, let's say $40B yearly, then at 20% profit tax they should pay $5B. And that looks like a too high, government didn't spend nearly that much on providing…
The point about Apple hiring best graduates who got their education mostly free of charge cause of all the tax payers really shift my mind about the whole tax-avoidance thing.
Yes but the moral burden is not on Apple, it's on those graduates. If you got your education for free and now you make a fat salary from Apple, it's your job to give back. Not Apple's.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Those with wealth will always try to capture the system - whether its formal or informal. The natural state of any business is to try and become a monopoly because that maximizes rent taking ability - NOT competition. Practically the ONLY power able to stop monopolies from forming is the government. In absence of the government's ability to "meddle", businesses can and will cut deals with big competitors and squelch…
Monopolies are granted by governments. The free market has a natural solution to monopolies, it's called competition - startups. Big Cos will always lobby governments to add rules and regulation to raise the barrier of entry on their market and thus reduce competition. They, in fact, buy their monopoly from the government. Solution? Take away the government's ability to grant monopolies.
If there are sufficiently few rules and an lack of power in the government to enforce (Korea, Japan, Italy), giants may use corruption or organised crime to achieve this.
Less powerful governments are rarely a good solution to protect the small man. The right solution is to build checks and balances between the different wings of the government that make it difficult to "capture" all wings.