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Uber used 50 Dutch shell companies to dodge taxes on $6B in revenue

businessinsider.com.au

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Re: Uber used 50 Dutch shell companies to dodge taxes on $6B in revenue

#91
post #90

I've heard this suggested before: abolish all corporate tax and increase capital gains tax to equal income tax. This will level the playing field between large and small businesses, since the former has the means to dodge byzantine corporate tax laws. It will also give an incentive for companies to stay onshore. Any downsides?

What's to stop me from hiding my capital gains in a series of shell companies?

Good luck exfiltrating it back to your bank account.

Re: Uber used 50 Dutch shell companies to dodge taxes on $6B in revenue

#92
post #12
post #10

Companies pay taxes on profits not on revenue. This is meaningless outragebait.

While that is true (depending on the jurisdiction), I find it weird that this is so readily acceptable when talking about a corporation when all of us are taxed on our income before it even reaches our bank account.

Your personal income is for yourself. A corporation's revenue that goes towards expenses is for the customer. Say you buy a gold at $700, and turn it into gold jewelry that you sell it for a $1000. If the tax rate is 30%, and the jeweler is taxed on the revenue, the jeweler would have made no money at all! If you do tax the expenses, it would have to be passed straight to the consumer.

Re: Uber used 50 Dutch shell companies to dodge taxes on $6B in revenue

#93
Congress is corrupt (via lobbyists). Congress would make this illegal if congress men/women didn't sell out American Citizens.

88% of the cost of the US Fed gov is paid for by taxes by workers (income taxes). Less than 12% comes from all corp/business taxes combined with capital gains (taxing the rich 1%). Business shifting tax burden to workers is a massive scale problem. $3.5 Trillion = US Tax Revenues (2019) and 88% came from workers.

Re: Uber used 50 Dutch shell companies to dodge taxes on $6B in revenue

#94

Congress is corrupt (via lobbyists). Congress would make this illegal if congress men/women didn't sell out American Citizens. 88% of the cost of the US Fed gov is paid for by taxes by workers (income taxes). Less than 12% comes from all corp/business taxes combined with capital gains (taxing the rich 1%). Business shifting tax burden to workers is a massive scale problem. $3.5 Trillion = US Tax Revenues (2019) and 8…

Do you have a source for these stats?

Re: Uber used 50 Dutch shell companies to dodge taxes on $6B in revenue

#95

If IP and shell companies infuriate you. I invite you to investigate why all billionaires have foundations or its cousin structures and "give" their wealth to it... Clue: tax and inheritance (tax) avoidance. Bill, Buffett, etc. are hypocrites. But it is not new, even in the Bible they spoke about it (Matthew 6:2): "So when you give to the needy, do not announce it with trumpets, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues…

How would someone at that level of wealth give in a more empathetic way? What should Bill and Buffett be doing instead?

Re: Uber used 50 Dutch shell companies to dodge taxes on $6B in revenue

#96
post #91
post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's to stop me from hiding my capital gains in a series of shell companies?

Good luck exfiltrating it back to your bank account.

If the money is in your company then it's in one of your accounts somewhere.

Re: Uber used 50 Dutch shell companies to dodge taxes on $6B in revenue

#97
post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>US taxes global individual income... Always wondered why US citizens do not make a bigger deal out of this. If I understand correctly, if you are a US citizen, but live somewhere else in the world, IRS still expects to be paid tax from your individual income in that foreign country (possibly in addition to the tax you pay in your country of residence) right? I assume there are minimum income thresholds but still...…

US citizens make something of a deal out of it, as you can see from expat forums every spring when tax-filing season comes. However, relatively few American citizens abroad choose to renounce their citizenship because they find it useful to retain it. The minimum income threshold to pay income taxes (otherwise you just file) is ~$100,000, so that generally means most middle-class people don’t have to pay. The real pa…

It costs a few thousand to renounce it anyway.

The Foreign Earned Income Exclusion is what you're referring to.

Re: Uber used 50 Dutch shell companies to dodge taxes on $6B in revenue

#98
post #90

I've heard this suggested before: abolish all corporate tax and increase capital gains tax to equal income tax. This will level the playing field between large and small businesses, since the former has the means to dodge byzantine corporate tax laws. It will also give an incentive for companies to stay onshore. Any downsides?

What's to stop me from hiding my capital gains in a series of shell companies?

You need to follow laws to funnel money through your shell companies. In turn, global agreement could require a tax small tax for any capital gains transfers made by each of those shell companies. The end result is that companies can still dodge taxes, but the more law-abiding ones aren't quite as efficient at doing so. That said, I haven't investigated the details of how this might work, and I'm sure like anything humans invent, there will be exceptions. Perhaps it would apply to large companies only, and suddenly lots of companies break up to become smaller affiliated investors that just happen to invest in the same companies in various jurisdictions, perhaps through an unaffiliated managed ETF. If there's benefit -- read: profit -- to working around a law, I'm sure folks will find a way, unfortunately.

Re: Uber used 50 Dutch shell companies to dodge taxes on $6B in revenue

#99

If IP and shell companies infuriate you. I invite you to investigate why all billionaires have foundations or its cousin structures and "give" their wealth to it... Clue: tax and inheritance (tax) avoidance. Bill, Buffett, etc. are hypocrites. But it is not new, even in the Bible they spoke about it (Matthew 6:2): "So when you give to the needy, do not announce it with trumpets, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues…

Can someone create a Dutch-shell-companies-as-as-service (DSCaaS), generate and submit all legal documents automatically, and help normal citizens dodge the same amount of taxes?

Re: Uber used 50 Dutch shell companies to dodge taxes on $6B in revenue

#100

I've heard this suggested before: abolish all corporate tax and increase capital gains tax to equal income tax. This will level the playing field between large and small businesses, since the former has the means to dodge byzantine corporate tax laws. It will also give an incentive for companies to stay onshore. Any downsides?

Corporate tax does not make sense because "income" and "profit" for a company are very loosely defined. Instead, a simple GST on products and services should be enough. Unambiguous and easy to reason about, with very less maneuverability to avoid.

In fact, I would rather income tax for individuals also be done away with. Just tax every transaction in the market. That is much fairer and presents less avenues to avoid tax.

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