Activision Blizzard has moved billions of dollars of profit into tax havens

Post by yesenadam » Mon, Aug 05, 2019, 3:16 AM UTC

thaumasiotes wrote: post #199

adventured wrote: post #193

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> No elite ever invented any such things. That's very easy to disprove as a claim. Engineers in the US and elsewhere routinely get very wealthy from companies they found or are involved with and their inventions. Robert Noyce invented the first practical integrated circuit and was quite wealthy. As a brilliant engineer he co-founded both Intel and Fairchild. There's probably nobody in the history of the semiconductor…

> Bill Gates started the first software company. ...?

Post by throwaway2048 » Mon, Aug 05, 2019, 3:30 AM UTC

shaftoe wrote: post #71

scarejunba wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Rational self-interest isn’t an unalloyed good (or even necessarily a good of any sort) so I don’t understand why you’re saying what you’re saying. Yes, sometimes for some people “fuck them for acting out of rational self-interest”. Rational self-interest for Intuit is lobbying to keep the tax code complex, but fuck them for it.

It's reasonable to assume all entities act out of rational self-interest. To be angry with someone when they simply defend their own interests is to either hate the person/entity or to be angry with nature itself. That was my only point.

Post by Phanyxx » Mon, Aug 05, 2019, 5:54 AM UTC

FireBeyond wrote: post #156

Scoundreller wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I could see it now. Starbucks develops a "new brew". They fly the best coffee connoisseurs to a Liberian-flagged, Korean-built ship sailing from Saipan to Nauru, and develop a new formula there with equal parts Arabic beans and Robusta beans. They sell this new product worldwide, with marketing from a PR team domiciled in Malta, but operating in the Netherlands. Where was the value created?

Blizzard's programmers develop a game in the US. It's hosted on US servers. It has an in-game currency system/DLC system, also hosted in the US, and processes card transactions in the US. However, at the same time, they claim that the entity that runs the DLC purchase system is in Malta, where Blizzard has no employees, but uses an outside legal and accounting firm. They claim all the value is in Malta. I tend to dis…

Post by Fnoord » Mon, Aug 05, 2019, 6:06 AM UTC

TAForObvReasons wrote: post #197

coldtea wrote: post #186

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For one, because we don't tax to "punish" (e.g. use of local resources) or to encourage, but to create a pool of money our governments can use for country-wide works, defense funding, and so on.

To be fair, our sales, income, and wealth tax policies also reflect our societal values. Some jurisdictions tax sugary drinks partly as an attempt to "punish" or reduce consumption.

Post by Fnoord » Mon, Aug 05, 2019, 8:45 AM UTC

mobilemidget wrote: post #208

Fnoord wrote: post #207

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The correct word is discourage, not punish.

Depends who you ask though, who is paying the taxes. But true, the real punishment comes if you decide not to pay your taxes...