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Uber used 50 Dutch shell companies to dodge taxes

businessinsider.com

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Re: Uber used 50 Dutch shell companies to dodge taxes

#111

Post by JI00912 »

beckman466 wrote: post #104
speleding wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm also Dutch, but I'm mainly frustrated that the press does a very poor job of explaining what is going on. Uber has its corporate head quarters for the EU in Amsterdam. For a company the size of Uber to have 50 different entities is not particularly special, you will find several other multinationals there with the same number. It makes sense to have one for each jurisdiction they operate in, for example. The term…

> The term "shell companies" seems to imply something nefarious Well considering they are mostly used by big corporations/capitalist firms to avoid all kinds of responsibilities to society, I seriously question your lack of critique here. Maybe the way to frame this is that tax avoidance (or in corporate speak: 'tax planning') has become horribly normalized by the media. I think most of the working class have no idea…

> Well considering they are usually used by corporations/capitalist firms to avoid all kinds of responsibilities to society, I seriously question your lack of critique here.

No they're usually used by basically all companies that aren't tiny.

> institutional terrorism that is going on on a daily basis

Ummm...

> They are gaslit with propaganda

Eh take a hard look in the mirror. The marxist hate machine has never helped anyone.

Re: Uber used 50 Dutch shell companies to dodge taxes

#112

Post by JI00912 »

emn13 wrote: post #110
whywhywhywhy wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How would you even prevent it? I'm more tired of being told "Billionaires and megacorps will pay for X" when we know they never will. Taxes are only for the working and middle class.

The real fix is taxing revenue, not profit. The 50 shell companies here are surely useful to Uber, but the core problem here is that Uber is at least on paper non profitable, and therefore doesn't owe taxes. The fact that it plays some kind of shell game is likely due to the fact that the concept of profit depends on how the boundaries are drawn, and it wants to ensure that it controls those boundaries, such that no…

If you make 100$ and spend 150$, you have revenue of 100$, no profit and a debt of 50$. So you'd have to pay taxes on the 100$ from your -50$.

Re: Uber used 50 Dutch shell companies to dodge taxes

#113

Post by demadog »

kossTKR wrote: post #54
technicolorwhat wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Im dutch too and im super frustrated about this. I don't care about paying taxes (I've done so for the last 20+ years) even if they go as high as 52%. But it really irritates me that: - other companies with this tax deals pay almost nothing - its unfair and destroys local competition i.e a Starbucks vs mom's coffee bar.

The same thing is happening in _all_ countries. I'm from Scandinavia, and plenty of large US corporations pay zero taxes because of very complex arrangements. Regular people with smaller companies have to pay high taxes though. It's called soft imperialism. The US / Transnational empire forces all countries to "open their markets", either via direct war, og in allied states, via soft power. Then various firms like Mc…

Is there a good book that dives into this topic in more detail?

Re: Uber used 50 Dutch shell companies to dodge taxes

#114

Post by dalbasal »

Uber might be very sophisticated in its tax avoidance, but it's probably not a good example for research... inasmuch as the research has a policy focus.

Uber lose money. Corporate income tax is paid on profit.

These article frustrate me: "In 2019, Uber claimed $4.5 billion in global operating losses (excluding the US and China) for tax purposes — in reality, it brought in $5.8 billion in operating revenue."

Unless I'm missing something, these aren't contradictory. Uber really does lose money. That doesn't mean that there's nothing more to say, but it doesn't imply what the article article seems to think it does.

A business publication should have basic accounting literacy. This feels like a collection of other people's tweets, with more information lost than added. I suspect the author has not even read his own sources, beyond headlines.

Re: Uber used 50 Dutch shell companies to dodge taxes

#115

Post by hhirsch »

rjmunro wrote: post #69

As soon as I read "In 2019, Uber claimed $4.5 billion in global operating losses ... in reality, it brought in $5.8 billion in operating revenue." I think either whoever wrote this has no idea what they are talking about, or they are trying to trick readers. "in reality" implies there is a contradiction or fraud, when it's totally possible to have $5.8 billion in operating revenue and still make a $4.5 loss. All this…

Business Insider either does not understand the difference between revenue and profit or they would like to manufacture outrage among their readers

Corporate taxes are paid on profit, not revenue.

As a consolation for those begrudging their tax accounting scheme, operating Cashflow is still negative, meaning they are bleeding cash. How would you turn a profit while losing money from operations?

If that does not improve, Uber in the end may not be a viable business.

https://finance.yahoo.com/quote/UBER/cash-flow/

Re: Uber used 50 Dutch shell companies to dodge taxes

#116

Post by cowsandmilk »

JI00912 wrote: post #111
beckman466 wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The term "shell companies" seems to imply something nefarious Well considering they are mostly used by big corporations/capitalist firms to avoid all kinds of responsibilities to society, I seriously question your lack of critique here. Maybe the way to frame this is that tax avoidance (or in corporate speak: 'tax planning') has become horribly normalized by the media. I think most of the working class have no idea…

> Well considering they are usually used by corporations/capitalist firms to avoid all kinds of responsibilities to society, I seriously question your lack of critique here. No they're usually used by basically all companies that aren't tiny. > institutional terrorism that is going on on a daily basis Ummm... > They are gaslit with propaganda Eh take a hard look in the mirror. The marxist hate machine has never helpe…

> No they're usually used by basically all companies that aren't tiny.

This argument is just “everyone does it.”

The 50 companies likely has little to do with taxes; let’s say it is for liability. Is that a good thing? The profits move out of a company, leaving nothing for when others are seeking damages. Is that a positive?

Re: Uber used 50 Dutch shell companies to dodge taxes

#117

Post by p0la »

speleding wrote: post #96
dstick wrote: post #4

I'm getting more and more frustrated by my own country's willingness to facilitate this. It just doesn't make any sense. From what I can tell it's all based on old-fashioned debunked economic theories in the same vain as "trickle-down-economy". There's a growing resistance to the Netherlands as a "Doorsluisland", and our current administration's political turmoil will hopefully provide the momentum for actual change…

I'm also Dutch, but I'm mainly frustrated that the press does a very poor job of explaining what is going on. Uber has its corporate head quarters for the EU in Amsterdam. For a company the size of Uber to have 50 different entities is not particularly special, you will find several other multinationals there with the same number. It makes sense to have one for each jurisdiction they operate in, for example. The term…

As a French entrepreneur, I was advised several times to move my HQ to the Netherlands because of the extremely low taxes on intellectual property. The HQ can invoice european subsidies/entities for the usage of the brand as well as the IP of internal software or patents. You calibrate this so that European subsidies makes little to no profit, so you don’t pay any local tax. Then, what amounts essentially to the profit of all your European subsidies is brought back to your NL headquarters under “revenue from intellectual property” on which you pay ~ no tax (I’ve been told around 5%). I’m not an expert in taxes and I have not looked into this in details so this may all be wrong, but it’s advice we got from top 10 EU lawyer firms. It was presented to us as a tax “optimisation” scheme.

Re: Uber used 50 Dutch shell companies to dodge taxes

#118

Post by cal5k »

whywhywhywhy wrote: post #107
dstick wrote: post #4

I'm getting more and more frustrated by my own country's willingness to facilitate this. It just doesn't make any sense. From what I can tell it's all based on old-fashioned debunked economic theories in the same vain as "trickle-down-economy". There's a growing resistance to the Netherlands as a "Doorsluisland", and our current administration's political turmoil will hopefully provide the momentum for actual change…

How would you even prevent it? I'm more tired of being told "Billionaires and megacorps will pay for X" when we know they never will. Taxes are only for the working and middle class.

Stop believing the lies politicians tell you?

The best thing for the middle and working class would be broad-based tax cuts, and yet the political narrative in most developed countries continues to be unabashed "hose the rich" tripe that in every case results in a larger burden on working and middle class families, often indirectly through a higher cost of living.

It's rational for large companies to spend basically up to the amount they would lose to taxes to legally avoid them. No individual can marshal those kinds of resources.

The better solution than continuously trying to find more and more ways to tax everything is to simply lower taxes, thus reducing the incentive to avoid them.

I even see this as a moral imperative, since top marginal personal income tax rates > 50% (not even accounting for sales tax, property tax, payroll tax, etc.) in many developed countries are tantamount to theft in my view.

Re: Uber used 50 Dutch shell companies to dodge taxes

#119

Post by beckman466 »

JI00912 wrote: post #111
beckman466 wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The term "shell companies" seems to imply something nefarious Well considering they are mostly used by big corporations/capitalist firms to avoid all kinds of responsibilities to society, I seriously question your lack of critique here. Maybe the way to frame this is that tax avoidance (or in corporate speak: 'tax planning') has become horribly normalized by the media. I think most of the working class have no idea…

> Well considering they are usually used by corporations/capitalist firms to avoid all kinds of responsibilities to society, I seriously question your lack of critique here. No they're usually used by basically all companies that aren't tiny. > institutional terrorism that is going on on a daily basis Ummm... > They are gaslit with propaganda Eh take a hard look in the mirror. The marxist hate machine has never helpe…

> No they're usually used by basically all companies that aren't tiny.

Ummm... that's what I said. That's my point. It's become normalized for corporations to not take responsibility. The working class always ends up paying the price here. Collectively we in the working class now expect corporations to treat us badly and that we have to accept this abusive behavior. In the context of more and more of the working class now starting to work in "non-jobs" in the gig economy, this current trajectory is becoming a bigger and bigger nightmare for the working class all over the world (see Nomadland, Sorry to Bother You, The True Cost, Blood in the Mobile, Push (Fredrik Gertten)).

I argue that, along with banking and other rentierist institutions [1], tech corporations are a parasite on society because they monopolize and destroy our shared inheritance, and try to pretend they are immune to regulation because they see themselves as lone geniuses [2].

"By virtue of their position as digital middlemen, Silicon Valley companies are able to extract vast amounts of capital from all over the world. The most salient example is Apple: recently crowned the world’s most valuable company, Apple rakes in enormous quarterly profits even as the Chinese workers who actually assemble its products are driven to suicide.

Whereas we were once led to believe that the network society would produce an egalitarian world, we increasingly see tech as a machine for the commodification of information itself. Something that has the potential to be abundant is made artificially scarce, because capital finds it profitable to enclose the digital commons and dictate its terms of access. Facebook wants a monopoly over your social network so it can show you ads; Google is the internet’s directory; Netflix, Spotify, YouTube, and Apple Music are your tollbooths for cultural production; Amazon is the gateway for your retail needs. These corporations serve social functions integral to modern life, in ways similar to industries that were nationalised in the past — and yet, not only are they not publicly owned, they are immune to any sort of democratic control." [3]

[1] the UK working class pays £192,000,000 per day in interest payments to banks (we essentially pay extortionate 'rent' for the money we use in our daily lives): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZzCegQVljdY

[2] https://www.technologyreview.com/2015/08/04/166593/techs-end...

[3] https://tribunemag.co.uk/2019/01/abolish-silicon-valley

Re: Uber used 50 Dutch shell companies to dodge taxes

#120

Post by JI00912 »

dalbasal wrote: post #114

Uber might be very sophisticated in its tax avoidance, but it's probably not a good example for research... inasmuch as the research has a policy focus. Uber lose money. Corporate income tax is paid on profit. These article frustrate me: " In 2019, Uber claimed $4.5 billion in global operating losses (excluding the US and China) for tax purposes — in reality, it brought in $5.8 billion in operating revenue. " Unless…

If Uber lost 4.5 billion, that also means they spent at least that much money. That's a lot of people who were able to sell good and services. That's actually a good thing. And while spending this money, Uber provided a useful service.

Besides the journalist apparently not understanding how taxation works, the phrasing is used to make the situation sound nefarious without providing any evidence. 50 shell companies? Ok...? What if it was 20, would that still be suspicious? Or just 1? How many are ok? What are they used for? No info at all. The entire 'article' is a bunch of random remarks with no context.

This is not journalism. This unresearched text belongs far down in somewhere in a comment field.

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