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Czech Republic proposes the highest digital tax rate in Europe

bloomberg.com

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Re: Czech Republic proposes the highest digital tax rate in Europe

#11

Post by qmanjamz »

rafiki6 wrote: post #7
topicseed wrote: post #3

Targeted advertising is not the only or even main space in which global giants avoid taxes. So not sure why such a focus on FB and Google.

Selection bias. HN community tends towards disliking Google/FB, and will tend to show articles that target those kinds of tech giants. In all honesty, they do have monopolies and it seems that the same type of anti-trust enforcement that was used to help Apple/Google in the browser war against Microsoft just isn't there anymore. Now Google/FB really do have a monopoly on user data. I think properly regulating instead…

If you have to name more than one company, the companies you've named do not have a monopoly. They can at worst be a duopoly. However, with the existence of Amazon, Microsoft, Twitter, Snapchat, and others, Google/FB are not even really a duopoly.

But you're right that HN is immensely biased against Google and Facebook. That's why you frequently see commenters like yourself make the patently ridiculous claim that they are a monopoly.

Re: Czech Republic proposes the highest digital tax rate in Europe

#15

Post by laughinghan »

mtgx wrote: post #6
cle wrote: post #2

> The potential disparity between the value of personal data and what users receive in return creates space for governments to seek reimbursement on society’s behalf. Is there a way to leverage competition to reduce this disparity instead of taxation? If there were proper competition, would there be a disparity?

What would competition do in terms of how advertising companies benefit from user data? I think the point is to start forcing companies into thinking sensitive user data is a liability that is taxed or worse if they do anything "nefarious" with that data (where nefarious could be whatever we think to put in that law). So it's like asking for Coca-cola to "have competition" (which generally just creates more sugar sod…

This is brilliant, I've never thought of it this way.

In a sense, GDPR already kind of does this, increasing the burden of storing user data. Would be interesting to consider dramatically ramp up this burden---maybe with a literal tax---for behavioral data stored longer than 90 days (or some other grace period), like a weaker version of Maciej Ceglowski's Six Fixes. https://idlewords.com/talks/what_happens_next_will_amaze_you...

Re: Czech Republic proposes the highest digital tax rate in Europe

#16

Post by AlexTWithBeard »

gok wrote: post #12
AlexTWithBeard wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why humans have AMT, but corporations don't?

What? Corporations absolutely have an AMT.

Hmm... Looks like you're right.

How do they manage to pay zero taxes then? I thought AMT assumes that once you're beyond a certain level of income, your lose most deductions and essentially pay a certain percent of the income.

Re: Czech Republic proposes the highest digital tax rate in Europe

#17

Post by toomuchtodo »

tracer4201 wrote: post #13

Why single out Google and FB or tech in general? Is the belief that these companies pay less taxes than non tech companies? I don’t have the breadth nor depth on this topic, just wanting to learn.

Disproportionately deep pockets and impact. Research the breakup of Standard Oil (which became Exxon, Amoco, Mobil and Chevron) in the US. The power Standard Oil wielded was non-insignificant, as with behemoth tech companies.

While these regulatory actions are surprising to some, if you’re into history it’s no surprise it’s happening again, but to tech instead of oil.

Re: Czech Republic proposes the highest digital tax rate in Europe

#18

Post by ed_balls »

I have a feeling that this won't work. The only robust way to implement fair tax is to tax corporation 1%, but everyone in EEA has to do it. I know that taxing revenue is not optimal, but how much money corporations spend on gov audits, accounting what is profit and what is cost etc.

Re: Czech Republic proposes the highest digital tax rate in Europe

#19

Post by tootahe45 »

tracer4201 wrote: post #13

Why single out Google and FB or tech in general? Is the belief that these companies pay less taxes than non tech companies? I don’t have the breadth nor depth on this topic, just wanting to learn.

Because politicians attack things perceived as bad by the public. If there's a time to implement such a tax it's after a year of sensationalist (and largely fake) news about FB and Google, from exaggerated data breaches to helping terrorists.

Re: Czech Republic proposes the highest digital tax rate in Europe

#20

Post by protomyth »

Intermediary platforms such as Airbnb and Uber exacerbate cities’ housing problems and weaken worker protections.

Its interesting that this line has no support and just treated as fact for this article. Is there a source to explain the reasoning?

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