I have to pay 40% of my income as income tax. I have HAD ENOUGH. This is infuriating. What can we do?
40%? Usually that kind of rate applies to an upper progressive tax band. Where do you live?
Microsoft Irish subsidiary paid zero corporate tax on £220bn profit last year
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Re: Microsoft Irish subsidiary paid zero corporate tax on £220bn profit last year
#62Meanwhile my (single-person) company is paying around 20% corporation tax, and then I'm getting taxed a further 20-40% on top of that when I pay myself.
Surely the amount you pay yourself is deducted from the amount you pay 20% corporate tax on before you are taxed?
Probably not. Dividends aren’t a deductible expense for a Corp.
Income is (which is why the rates are higher).
Re: Microsoft Irish subsidiary paid zero corporate tax on £220bn profit last year
#631. It's infeasible that Microsoft had profits of 200 billion euros. 2. A comment on the Guardian's journalists' potential financial conflicts of interest: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27352245
Saying someone has a conflict of interest reporting on financial matters because they are unionized?
So by your argument, we definitely can not trust nearly any other news organisation, because they have shareholders and are operating for profit? How about your conflict of interest? Do you own stock? If yes, by your own argument you have a financial conflict of interest and can't be trusted.
Re: Microsoft Irish subsidiary paid zero corporate tax on £220bn profit last year
#64Meanwhile my (single-person) company is paying around 20% corporation tax, and then I'm getting taxed a further 20-40% on top of that when I pay myself.
Surely the amount you pay yourself is deducted from the amount you pay 20% corporate tax on before you are taxed?
There you pay 40-50% incometax first
Re: Microsoft Irish subsidiary paid zero corporate tax on £220bn profit last year
#65We should stop all taxation and use inflation to pay for everything instead. Much simpler and no one can get out of it.
Re: Microsoft Irish subsidiary paid zero corporate tax on £220bn profit last year
#66Earlier quoted context omitted.
The best tax is one that is imposed on an individual but paid at source by the corporation paying them. Individuals shouldn't see tax. That way the voters don't complain when you need to put it up. Sales tax is similarly a pain - particularly when you have differing rates. At which point we get into the famous is it a cake or a biscuit type cases to decide where the dividing line is.
To invert that: if people understood how much the services being provided to them cost they would not consume them. The goal of government shouldn't be to obscure the cost of government services. The cost should be justified.
> To invert that: if people understood how much the services being provided to them cost they would not consume them.
I don't think that's true. I think what is true, and what we've seen time and time again, is that people don't like the cost of services that others take advantage of that they don't need to.
Re: Microsoft Irish subsidiary paid zero corporate tax on £220bn profit last year
#67Why can't governments learn that taxing corporations is pointless? The same revenue is can be raised more simply through sales tax and personal income tax on salaries and distributions.
Taxing mega corporations is essential. I would add that you need to tax them to oblivion after shareholder’s expectations are reasonably satisfied. If you don’t, you essentially create rogue institutions with deep pockets that will attempt to take political control of the nation for their selfish interests. Adam Smith had interesting things to say about that.
> will attempt to take political control of the nation for their selfish interests
Kind of like the current lobbying going on all over the world?
Re: Microsoft Irish subsidiary paid zero corporate tax on £220bn profit last year
#68Meanwhile, its founder preaches redistribution and calls the governments to raise taxes. "The wealthy should make a bigger effort to clean public finances"
Re: Microsoft Irish subsidiary paid zero corporate tax on £220bn profit last year
#69Earlier quoted context omitted.
In the UK you only pay corporation tax on profit
The Republic of Ireland isn't part of the UK, but your point still applies.
The company is tax "resident" in Bermuda, a British Overseas Territory.
In fact I'm not even sure what the Ireland connection is here except that there is a registered office in Dublin. It seems like all the action is taking place in Bermuda, so this is really a story about UK overseas tax havens.
Re: Microsoft Irish subsidiary paid zero corporate tax on £220bn profit last year
#70Why can't governments learn that taxing corporations is pointless? The same revenue is can be raised more simply through sales tax and personal income tax on salaries and distributions.
The revenue is only the same because we dont actually collect corporation tax because we let people avoid it. To act like there's no additional benefit on taxing literally billions in revenue is absolutely nonsensical.
Say you redirect $100 million away from Microsoft's research into artificial intelligence and redirect it to a government project promoting artificial intelligence research + junkets for government employees.
It is certainly plausible that a tax will provide no additional benefit. Microsoft is one of the great value creators of the late 20th/early 21st century. it is not immediately obvious why redirecting money away from the company is a good idea.