Three European Countries Block Tax on Tech Giants • Hacker News Board

Re: Three European Countries Block Tax on Tech Giants

#201

Post by bsaul » Tue, Nov 06, 2018, 7:41 PM UTC

bluecalm wrote: post #186

Isofarro wrote: post #168

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If US corporations hike their prices up to cover the tax, that would increase the competitiveness of local companies who have already been paying their fair share of tax. Perhaps that's the encouragement governments need to stimulate the local economy further.

Sounds like tariffs. If you want that - fine it makes sense. Just don't bully others to apply tax rate of your choosing on terms you want on business outside your country.

European union doesn’t let members decide on tarifs on their own borders.

Re: Three European Countries Block Tax on Tech Giants

#202

Post by tormeh » Tue, Nov 06, 2018, 7:46 PM UTC

nradov wrote: post #74

digianarchist wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ireland have already been given some lucky charms by the EU. For example, they were given permission to set their corporate taxes to a ridiculously low 12.5%.

Why would a sovereign state even need permission from others about purely internal matters such as corporate income tax rates?

They don't. What Ireland has signed on, is that, just as in any EU country, the corporate tax must be equal for all. National or local governments cannot negotiate deals with specific companies. This is a promise they have broken, and the cause of all the noise about Irish tax.

Seeing so many people discussing this under wrong assumptions, even on HN, makes me sad and makes me think there's a very low ceiling on tax complexity, above which people lose track completely. This means we'll never be able to fix tax. Only tax lawyers will ever even begin to grasp it. It's also a pretty good argument against direct democracy as well as an argument for abolishing the corporate tax completely.

Re: Three European Countries Block Tax on Tech Giants

#203

Post by plandis » Tue, Nov 06, 2018, 7:48 PM UTC

bsaul wrote: post #173

simias wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I mean this is a tax problem first and foremost isn't it? The problem being that it's hard for countries to enforce regulations in a virtualized, globalized economy. It's true that it's not just about tax, you also have issues regarding what is and isn't legal in a given country (nazi apology is illegal in France for instance, but good luck enforcing that on the web. Similarly the super harsh "no nudity" rule on amer…

I’m pro europe, but let’s face it, if we can’t get any kind of cooperation between state members regarding taxes, then maybe it’s time to rethink the inside mechanicsm of the union ( which may include restart from scratch with fewer countries). This revenue tax won’t change anything. It’s just ransom, and i hate feeling like my representatives make me look like a lazy thief. I’d even prefer something like what china…

What does Google have a monopoly on? Do you not have access to iOS? Do you not have access to DuckDuckGo and Bing?

Re: Three European Countries Block Tax on Tech Giants

#204

Post by bsaul » Tue, Nov 06, 2018, 7:50 PM UTC

user5994461 wrote: post #176

bsaul wrote: post #82

As a french, seing french government officials trying to impose their knee-jerk « let’s tax it » reaction to any kind of problem makes me absolutely sick. They’re just a bunch of jealous incompetent insufferable pompous politicians than don’t understand a thing about the private sector and so instead of trying to fix the numerous reason why we don’t have any competitor to google / facebook etc ( such as our best engi…

France has a competitor to Google and that's called Criteo, one of the biggest ad business in this continent.

http://gs.statcounter.com/search-engine-market-share/all/eur...

Re: Three European Countries Block Tax on Tech Giants

#205

Post by bsaul » Tue, Nov 06, 2018, 7:56 PM UTC

zilian wrote: post #144

bsaul wrote: post #82

As a french, seing french government officials trying to impose their knee-jerk « let’s tax it » reaction to any kind of problem makes me absolutely sick. They’re just a bunch of jealous incompetent insufferable pompous politicians than don’t understand a thing about the private sector and so instead of trying to fix the numerous reason why we don’t have any competitor to google / facebook etc ( such as our best engi…

You totally underestimate the governement ability to understand things.

They have a background, a history. They’ve spent the last 40 years adding layer upon layer of tax and subvention mechanism to try to regulate the economy while solving zero fundamental issues ( unemployment, industry, global private sector attractivness, education and recently even healthcare).

The only thing they’ve managed to do is to increase the cost of the public sector. So yes, indeed i don’t have any kind of trust in their ability to understand pretty much anything.

Re: Three European Countries Block Tax on Tech Giants

#206

Post by kokey » Tue, Nov 06, 2018, 7:58 PM UTC

kachurovskiy wrote: post #99

bsaul wrote: post #82

As a french, seing french government officials trying to impose their knee-jerk « let’s tax it » reaction to any kind of problem makes me absolutely sick. They’re just a bunch of jealous incompetent insufferable pompous politicians than don’t understand a thing about the private sector and so instead of trying to fix the numerous reason why we don’t have any competitor to google / facebook etc ( such as our best engi…

Please help me understand why is it okay to tax people on income but not corporations?

Sales tax and income tax covers everything more efficiently in the right location. Sales tax takes place in the country where the products are sold, then that income to the company is distributed between staff and shareholders who pay income tax where they live and work. Corporation tax is some kind of tax on efficiency and usually in not in an optimal location for the benefit of society, either by accident or on purpose.

Re: Three European Countries Block Tax on Tech Giants

#207

Post by bsaul » Tue, Nov 06, 2018, 7:59 PM UTC

plandis wrote: post #203

bsaul wrote: post #173

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m pro europe, but let’s face it, if we can’t get any kind of cooperation between state members regarding taxes, then maybe it’s time to rethink the inside mechanicsm of the union ( which may include restart from scratch with fewer countries). This revenue tax won’t change anything. It’s just ransom, and i hate feeling like my representatives make me look like a lazy thief. I’d even prefer something like what china…

What does Google have a monopoly on? Do you not have access to iOS? Do you not have access to DuckDuckGo and Bing?

http://gs.statcounter.com/search-engine-market-share/all/eur...

Re: Three European Countries Block Tax on Tech Giants

#208

Post by J_cst » Tue, Nov 06, 2018, 7:59 PM UTC

bluecalm wrote: post #177

titanix2 wrote: post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I support it too. Big corporations pay almost no taxes in our country; instead it is individual and small and medium entreprises that are heavily taxed. This makes it very hard to start and run a business in the long term.

They pay VAT for sells in your country. It doesn't matter if it's consumer or a company paying the tax, the amount is added to the price. If you want them tax then increase that. Why do you feel entitled to profits of the company that isn't based in your country? It's like thinking the company should pay 5m in tax in Ireland based on sells in France while being ok with them deducting expenses from unrelated business…

AFAIK Vat is a tax which insist on consumers, not on companies.

Re: Three European Countries Block Tax on Tech Giants

#209

Post by lambdadmitry » Tue, Nov 06, 2018, 8:03 PM UTC

Shivetya wrote: post #172

simias wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I mean this is a tax problem first and foremost isn't it? The problem being that it's hard for countries to enforce regulations in a virtualized, globalized economy. It's true that it's not just about tax, you also have issues regarding what is and isn't legal in a given country (nazi apology is illegal in France for instance, but good luck enforcing that on the web. Similarly the super harsh "no nudity" rule on amer…

having a uniform tax code would pretty much doom the small economies to not having opportunity to grown unless it was "granted to them" as a favor by the same union government. the ability of member states to set their own taxes is about the only protection they have handling down turns and getting new industry. their currency was given up and without the ability to print money they need other means to mitigate adver…

I'm not sure that blaming Greece problems on the EU instead of unsustainable social policies and populist and/or corrupt politicians is fair. After all, a populist with more knobs to their country's economy is still a populist and, if anything, will bury the country's economy even faster.

Re: Three European Countries Block Tax on Tech Giants

#210

Post by simias » Tue, Nov 06, 2018, 8:04 PM UTC

Shivetya wrote: post #172

simias wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I mean this is a tax problem first and foremost isn't it? The problem being that it's hard for countries to enforce regulations in a virtualized, globalized economy. It's true that it's not just about tax, you also have issues regarding what is and isn't legal in a given country (nazi apology is illegal in France for instance, but good luck enforcing that on the web. Similarly the super harsh "no nudity" rule on amer…

having a uniform tax code would pretty much doom the small economies to not having opportunity to grown unless it was "granted to them" as a favor by the same union government. the ability of member states to set their own taxes is about the only protection they have handling down turns and getting new industry. their currency was given up and without the ability to print money they need other means to mitigate adver…

I agree that "uniform" wasn't the right word, I was thinking more about cooperating and managing taxes as a whole (in order to find a compromise that would benefit everybody). It doesn't mean that everybody would have the same taxes but at least there would be some level of coherency.

>In the US it works by forcing states to compete on regulation and taxes which benefits everyone.

Everyone except the environment at least, it's often the first regulation to go. This kind of competition gives an edge to rich people and big companies who can afford to relocate if they dislike the way they're taxed or regulated somewhere, meanwhile low-skilled workers and small companies can't generally move a thousand of km away on a whim.

In Europe this is even worse because we have cultural and language barriers. Even for an educated worker moving from London to Berlin to Paris to Prague is not a simple thing at all. The only ones who benefit from this infighting are large companies and rich people who can more easily relocate their income in order to get the best deal possible.

See the whole Amazon HQ2 thing for an example of that in the US, you end up with a huge company getting great benefits that no small player could ever dream of. How is that fair and how does that benefit everyone? How does tech giants moving to Ireland to pay less taxes benefit everyone? It benefits Ireland arguably, but overall the EU gets less money than we otherwise would.

I mean just for the sake of the argument we could imagine that the EU as a whole would agree to tax these tech giants a certain amount, bigger than what Ireland makes them pay now. Then we give the Irish exactly the same amount they're currently receiving and we redistribute the rest within the EU. Wouldn't we be objectively better off in this scenario?

Now of course that would be a weird arrangement but you see my point, the real winners here are Google and Facebook, not Ireland, Germany or Poland.