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Ikea founder leaves fortune to no one, structures it to ensure it lasts forever

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Re: Ikea founder leaves fortune to no one, structures it to ensure it lasts forever

#311

Post by patall »

elmar wrote: post #105
viraptor wrote: post #45

> The foundation owns itself, so no Kamprad family members hold shares. Late stage capitalism... Anyway, I don't really get why the article claims he didn't care about money. It's known for a while that IKEA avoids taxes in many dodgy ways. If he really didn't care, the connected companies could pay a reasonable amount.

>"If he really didn't care, the connected companies could pay a reasonable amount" He probably thought that the money would be better spent for the good of society by private institutions than by the government.

Sure, thats why he let some of his products be produced by political prisoners in states like the GDR. Please excuse, my sarcasm but this man was not the good guy, even if he wanted to make everyone believe that.

Re: Ikea founder leaves fortune to no one, structures it to ensure it lasts forever

#312

Post by dagw »

seanmcdirmid wrote: post #305
dagw wrote: post #189

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It was obviously a well crafted image, but hardly one invented out of whole cloth. For example non of the three homes he owned[0] would classify as luxury by any reasonable rich person standard. His 'luxury' house in Switzerland was probably not even among 10 most expensive houses in town and was significantly smaller than most billionaires garages. His house in Sweden is in the middle of nowhere, the sort of place w…

Not too shabby for Lausanne.

Sure, but also far from the most expensive house in Lausanne.

Re: Ikea founder leaves fortune to no one, structures it to ensure it lasts forever

#313

Post by andrepd »

charlesdm wrote: post #84
andrepd wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh nice, if he thought he could use the money better, then sure, please carry on not paying taxes. Can I do the same? Or is that a privilege reserved for the mega-rich? Or let's call a spade a spade, and let's call tax evasion tax evasion.

Want to stop avoidance? Make proper laws. If it's legal (even through lobbying), then it is legal. And frankly I don't see why you shouldn't if you legally can. But to each their own views on this. You know who can stop avoidance? Politicians. They need to take responsibility. Feel free to shame multinationals or HNWIs for not paying taxes, but at the end of the day avoidance is only possible because politicians (or…

It's interesting because you pretty much said it in your first paragraph: it's legal, through lobbying. Make proper laws? How, if it's the companies benefiting from the current state of affairs writing those laws? How, if the government isn't serving us the people, but the interests of those that can grease the palms of the persons in charge?

Re: Ikea founder leaves fortune to no one, structures it to ensure it lasts forever

#315

Post by mulmen »

charlesdm wrote: post #308
seanmcdirmid wrote: post #304

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If he didn't care about money personally, why did he move to Switzerland from Sweden to avoid paying taxes? There is also that weird non-profit cooperative that IKEA masquerades as to avoid paying corporate taxes as well. Whatever can be said about the founder of IKEA, he really knew how to avoid taxes!

Because there is no point in being frugal if you have to pay significant corporate tax. And it helped expand "the empire" he was building, because he could reinvest everything. He most likely hated wasting money, whether that was on excessive expenses or taxes -- it makes no difference. The money is gone either way. I have a friend whose grandfather built quite a large retail business (in the billions). He said his g…

If you're paying significant corporate tax isn't being frugal even more important?

Re: Ikea founder leaves fortune to no one, structures it to ensure it lasts forever

#316

Post by vkou »

garmaine wrote: post #303
vkou wrote: post #266

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's because the point seems ideological, without any backing in reason. Why is a government buying a majority of a company's shares on the public markets bad? Why is one man, or an investment firm buying a majority of shares of a company any better? An attack on this is an attack on the concept of public markets. 'Public markets' does a lot of work in this claim. There's an obvious difference between shotgun natio…

That's not what's going on here. The government is saying: "give us Xkr" and then turning around and buying shares of the company. That's a two step process, but collapse the steps together and it's the same as the government saying "give us X shares of the company," which is nationalization -- the government taking control (even fractional control) of a company by force. If nothing else, company officers and the boa…

> but collapse the steps together and it's the same as the government saying "give us X shares of the company,"

Great, you've just described taxation.

> which is nationalization -- the government taking control (even fractional control) of a company by force.

How is buying shares on the public market with government money taking control of a company by force? No current shareholder is obligated to sell their shares.

Ah of course, taxation is theft... [1]

> If nothing else, company officers and the board have an obligation to shareholders, which would would not want to see their shares diluted in that way.

Shareholders voluntarily selling their shares to the government does not 'dilute' shares of other shareholders. It doesn't matter if the government's money came from taxing the company, some other company, or individuals.

[1] I'm sorry, but if you want to take advantage of a country's labour force and markets, you are expected to pay taxes. What the government does with that tax money is up to them.

Re: Ikea founder leaves fortune to no one, structures it to ensure it lasts forever

#317

Post by anonacct37 »

goty2 wrote: post #174
bmelton wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except that the laws are the rules, the rules are publicly published, and everyone has access to them. If McDonald's is selling a 10 piece McNuggets for $1.49, and a 20 piece for $4.99, then buying 2 x 10 piece McNuggets for $2.98 is a loophole around paying $4.99. If you find it immoral, so be it, but it doesn't change that you're paying more for McNuggets than McDonald's requires you to pay.

I don't find that to be an apt analogy. Tax avoidance is more like abusing coupons. Someone else is effectively paying your share, but the company can't shut it down because customer would complain or it could hurt the business overall. Eventually the business is forced to raise prices and everyone deal with coupons just to get a decent deal.

I feel like the phrase "coupon abuse" is madeup crap. A Business gives discounts in order to (hopefully) make more money, then try to ensure that we all see people who actually use those discounts as "abusers".

Don't fall for it.

It's not that complicated. If you are a business, don't sell stuff at a loss. If you want to sell stuff at a loss to drive traffic to your store, you're going to take a loss. Don't blame your customers.

Re: Ikea founder leaves fortune to no one, structures it to ensure it lasts forever

#318

Post by charlesdm »

mulmen wrote: post #315
charlesdm wrote: post #308

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because there is no point in being frugal if you have to pay significant corporate tax. And it helped expand "the empire" he was building, because he could reinvest everything. He most likely hated wasting money, whether that was on excessive expenses or taxes -- it makes no difference. The money is gone either way. I have a friend whose grandfather built quite a large retail business (in the billions). He said his g…

If you're paying significant corporate tax isn't being frugal even more important?

Flip the situation: a) I can be frugal and pay corporate tax; or b) I can be frugal and pay no corporate tax. He picked option b.. which is fine.

You don't start a business from the notion of funding the state.

Re: Ikea founder leaves fortune to no one, structures it to ensure it lasts forever

#319

Post by literallycancer »

rectang wrote: post #172
literallycancer wrote: post #164

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Anyone can benefit from OSS, corrupt individuals included. I'm not sure if that kind of action can help improve legislation or decrease the number of loopholes.

What, you were serious when you demanded that I personally fix the world? I'm still doing quite a bit and making the best use of my talents: way more than enough effort to call the facile critique of "start a political party".

Yes, I'm serious. All too many people just claim the system is broken and nothing can be done to fix it. Understanding how it works and fixing it can and does work. Can't speak for the US, but in Europe, it certainly can work.

Re: Ikea founder leaves fortune to no one, structures it to ensure it lasts forever

#320

Post by fludlight »

dragonwriter wrote: post #290
wahern wrote: post #285

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Related? http://teachingamericanhistory.org/library/document/bill-for... In the current political climate I wonder if fee tail could be brought back. The predominate opinion among economists and, especially, legal scholars on the far right seems to be in favor of removing any and all limitations on the enforceability of contracts and trusts, and I could see the far right in many states embrace a return of fee tail as…

> In the current political climate I wonder if fee tail could be brought back Unwinding capitalism as overly progressive and retreating to feudalism seems entirely in line with the politics of the present US ruling faction, and bringing back fee tail would be a natural step toward that.

Much of the world seems to be retreating to feudalism. China seems to be accelerating in this direction and Russia is already there.
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