Tech giants face 2% UK digital services tax
1–10 of 238 posts
Re: Tech giants face 2% UK digital services tax
#2Re: Tech giants face 2% UK digital services tax
#3The UK has gotten very frustrated with the slow movement of international lawmaking in this space. With business rate slashes to help struggling retailers (retaliation against Amazon) and mental health funding increases for schools (retaliation against Facebook/Google), I'm quite happy to see something happen at last.
I expect other governments to follow suit.
From a tech defence angle, I can't see Trump rallying in support of his good buddy, Jeff Bezos.
Re: Tech giants face 2% UK digital services tax
#4I wonder if the recent "link tax" forced into the proposed EU copyright legislation has something to do with making this "digital tax" work in practice. Wouldn't be the first time that copyright law is used for something completely different to what it was meant for.
Re: Tech giants face 2% UK digital services tax
#5Good. It is becoming more and more apparent that there is a toll on society created by these companies. They have a negative impact on our domestic businesses (traditional brick and mortar, as well as home-grown digital businesses) not to mention our mental health and even democracy. By taxing them, hopefully we can go some way to reversing some of that damage (although I'm less hopeful of that...).
Re: Tech giants face 2% UK digital services tax
#6Any supremely-profitable industry is bound to be taxed sooner or later, esp if its foreign.
I haven't seen any details though. Is it a % of ads sold? Or some other mechanism?
Re: Tech giants face 2% UK digital services tax
#7Good. It is becoming more and more apparent that there is a toll on society created by these companies. They have a negative impact on our domestic businesses (traditional brick and mortar, as well as home-grown digital businesses) not to mention our mental health and even democracy. By taxing them, hopefully we can go some way to reversing some of that damage (although I'm less hopeful of that...).
Also, what seems to have provoked this tax in the UK specifically is the tendency for such companies to artificially lower their profits to more or less avoid UK corporation tax altogether by claiming that sales of UK clicks to UK companies handled by UK based account managers were in fact completed in Ireland...
Re: Tech giants face 2% UK digital services tax
#8Good. It is becoming more and more apparent that there is a toll on society created by these companies. They have a negative impact on our domestic businesses (traditional brick and mortar, as well as home-grown digital businesses) not to mention our mental health and even democracy. By taxing them, hopefully we can go some way to reversing some of that damage (although I'm less hopeful of that...).
Also, what seems to have provoked this tax in the UK specifically is the tendency for such companies to artificially lower their profits to more or less avoid UK corporation tax altogether by claiming that sales of UK clicks to UK companies handled by UK based account managers were in fact completed in Ireland...
Exactly. I'm no fan of the current UK Government, but their hand has been forced. I'd rather all countries get together and ratify a standard for where profits can be realised. Hopefully this will open the dam for the others to get involved.
Re: Tech giants face 2% UK digital services tax
#9Good. It is becoming more and more apparent that there is a toll on society created by these companies. They have a negative impact on our domestic businesses (traditional brick and mortar, as well as home-grown digital businesses) not to mention our mental health and even democracy. By taxing them, hopefully we can go some way to reversing some of that damage (although I'm less hopeful of that...).
So you see it as a tariff? Do not let the more efficient foreign player in, to let the local equivalent develop?
Economically it does not make sense, if we are looking for a global optimum (literally); this is the standard free-trade argument.
It may make sense if there's no global trust; you don't want to depend on products of a potential unfriendly party, or let them have a large foothold in your economy, just, well, in case.
But here I (also) see the desire to milk a cow that can be milked.
Re: Tech giants face 2% UK digital services tax
#10They'll probably back down when companies threaten to leave. Like Amazon did when threatened with the Head Tax. Or how Dole left Hawaii.