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Shouting ‘pay your taxes,’ activists occupy Apple retail stores across France

marketwatch.com

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Re: Shouting ‘pay your taxes,’ activists occupy Apple retail stores across France

#31

Post by andmarios »

downandout wrote: post #14

These people are protesting against the wrong entity. Apple followed the tax laws at the time, so they should protest against their government for creating loopholes that can and always will be exploited by those with the resources to do so. Public companies have a fiduciary responsibility to their shareholders to maximize profits, which includes taking advantage of any and all available strategies to reduce their ta…

It would seem to me that having activists occupy your stores doesn't work very well toward maximizing your profits.

Re: Shouting ‘pay your taxes,’ activists occupy Apple retail stores across France

#32

Post by r3bl »

baddox wrote: post #30
r3bl wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Seems as dead simple to me as to argue about murder. If you're a company that's present in a certain geographic area, you're expected to pay taxes in that area. If you don't pay taxes and you actively work on not paying taxes, you're immoral. Done.

Yes, but the precise amount of taxes you should pay is not some moral principle. If the current tax laws were the “correct” amount, then the government passed a tax cut, are you morally obligated to keep paying the higher amount?

If those tax cuts were given specifically to you (as is the European Commission's conclusion[0]), then yes. It's immoral to pay less.

[0] http://europa.eu/rapid/press-release_IP-16-2923_en.htm

Re: Shouting ‘pay your taxes,’ activists occupy Apple retail stores across France

#34

Post by adventured »

21 wrote: post #16
pcurve wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Found another article. https://www.rte.ie/news/2017/0916/905202-donohoe-eu-tax-plan... "According to one diplomat, the strongest level of opposition came from Ireland, Malta and Cyprus. Luxembourg was said to have raised a series of practical problems about the proposal, arguing it would introduce a lot of complexity into the tax system." Go figure. Noncompetitive EU countries complaining the loudest.

Can't help notice that three of the four are tiny countries. And the fourth, Ireland, is not that big either. I'm starting to thing that there might also be a geopolitic reason to become a tax heaven, not just an economic one, something along the line "Let's convince Amazon to book profits here, and there let's see who will dare mess with us, given that Amazon will be protected by USA"

For a small nation, it's one of the few outsized competitive advantages they can try to offer (that is, something they can do that can benefit them far beyond the scale of their population).

Ireland's corporate tax rate + joining the European single market, resulted in one of the greatest booms in modern economic history. From $40 to $280 billion in GDP in just 17 years.

Given the extreme nature of the benefits, a small nation is probably crazy not to do it.

Re: Shouting ‘pay your taxes,’ activists occupy Apple retail stores across France

#35

Post by innocentoldguy »

beloch wrote: post #9

I really respect this kind of activism. Fair taxation certainly isn't the sexiest topic to hold a protest about, but it is actually a huge fundamental issue for us today. Individuals, and Corporations we treat as legal individuals, produce value for our society in several ways, and paying taxes is one of them. When wealthy individuals or large corporations dodge taxes via off-shore firms, etc. they erode the basis of…

Does this sort of activism really help? I mean, this isn't an Apple-only issue and if Apple is obeying tax laws, then are they really going to consider paying more just because a small group of people chanted in one of their stores for a while? Even if Apple is breaking the law, isn't it worth putting up with a handful of activists for a few hours if it saves them millions in taxes and makes their investors happy?

I think a more effective form of activism would be to flood representatives' offices with requests to change tax laws and to vote for candidates willing to do so. I think most governments and taxes in the world today render "fair taxation" an oxymoron. It is a mess at all levels and should be fixed, but I'm not sure localized protests at places of business are the most effective way to go about doing it.

Re: Shouting ‘pay your taxes,’ activists occupy Apple retail stores across France

#37

Post by seanmcdirmid »

jules wrote: post #15
cmansley wrote: post #2

Why does no one get mad at the governments who have the large tax loop holes? Shouldn't it be "Ireland close your loopholes!"

The problem is the EU, not Ireland. France should be able to tax apple on its own.

France does tax Apple on its own. They still pay VAT of course as well as on any profits classified as French (e.g. retail). The question is then everything else whose origin isn’t obvious.

Re: Shouting ‘pay your taxes,’ activists occupy Apple retail stores across France

#38

Post by Joakal »

PrimalDual wrote: post #36

Pardon my ignorance but I thought Apple largely obeyed the law. Shouldn’t these people be protesting the government that fails to tax Apple justly?

> “Apple must stop denying the tax practices highlighted by the European Commission’s investigation, withdraw its appeal to the European Court of Justice and pay its fine of 13 billion euros as quickly as possible,” said Aurélie Trouvé, spokesman for Attac, according to the release.

A blurb from article. It looks like the government already went after Apple.

Re: Shouting ‘pay your taxes,’ activists occupy Apple retail stores across France

#39

Post by eli_gottlieb »

innocentoldguy wrote: post #35
beloch wrote: post #9

I really respect this kind of activism. Fair taxation certainly isn't the sexiest topic to hold a protest about, but it is actually a huge fundamental issue for us today. Individuals, and Corporations we treat as legal individuals, produce value for our society in several ways, and paying taxes is one of them. When wealthy individuals or large corporations dodge taxes via off-shore firms, etc. they erode the basis of…

Does this sort of activism really help? I mean, this isn't an Apple-only issue and if Apple is obeying tax laws, then are they really going to consider paying more just because a small group of people chanted in one of their stores for a while? Even if Apple is breaking the law, isn't it worth putting up with a handful of activists for a few hours if it saves them millions in taxes and makes their investors happy? I…

>Does this sort of activism really help?

Yes. It reduces the company's bottom line until they either inflict bad publicity on themselves, sit and cope with it silently, or submit to the demand to pay their lawful taxes.

>I think a more effective form of activism would be to flood representatives' offices with requests to change tax laws and to vote for candidates willing to do so.

You're getting downvoted because we've got a lot of Americans on HN. For us, that approach failed as of last night.

Re: Shouting ‘pay your taxes,’ activists occupy Apple retail stores across France

#40

Post by devereaux »

Joakal wrote: post #38
PrimalDual wrote: post #36

Pardon my ignorance but I thought Apple largely obeyed the law. Shouldn’t these people be protesting the government that fails to tax Apple justly?

> “Apple must stop denying the tax practices highlighted by the European Commission’s investigation, withdraw its appeal to the European Court of Justice and pay its fine of 13 billion euros as quickly as possible,” said Aurélie Trouvé, spokesman for Attac, according to the release. A blurb from article. It looks like the government already went after Apple.

The protesters may not want to let justice run its course.
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