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Microsoft Irish subsidiary paid zero corporate tax on £220bn profit last year

theguardian.com

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Re: Microsoft Irish subsidiary paid zero corporate tax on £220bn profit last year

#131

Post by adolph »

tasogare wrote: post #33
fallingknife wrote: post #12

Why 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.

> Why can't governments learn that taxing corporations is pointless? Pure ideological point of view with no grounding in reality. It's totally possible to tax corporations. In fact, some state like Japan and South Korean get more money from enterprises than individuals, the reverse of Europe and US (until recently consumption tax was 5% in Japan, now is 8%, still far less than EU's typical 20%). The solution you prop…

A political challenge to taxing larger entities is that those entities have increased incentive to avoid tax. This has distortionary effects elsewhere in that it is logical for such an entity to pay fractional X toward a politician’s personal interest instead of the full X to the government.

Re: Microsoft Irish subsidiary paid zero corporate tax on £220bn profit last year

#132

Post by csomar »

jFriedensreich wrote: post #117

can someone explain how an irish company be tax resident of bermuda in the first place?

Like an American person can be a tax resident of France? Oh, wait, companies do not travel or move… or do they?

/justkidding

Re: Microsoft Irish subsidiary paid zero corporate tax on £220bn profit last year

#133

Post by seanmcdirmid »

edp wrote: post #102
rorykoehler wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No one pays that much in a progressive tax system. Every time this discussion comes up people spout off these numbers but if you calculate out how much you actually pay it's probably in the 20-30% of total salary range. That's still high but it's just dishonest and makes people look like idiots when they throw around 40% etc. If you are truly paying 40% of your income in tax you are earning millions and are benefitin…

Here in France, as a contractor, if I bill a client 100 000€ annually and decide to get as much as possible in personal income, 30 000€ will go as social taxes (health, retirement ...) and for the remaining 70 000€ you will have to pay around 25% as income tax (if you don't have any children). You will have an income of ~52 000€ for 100 000€ billed during the year. You're not earning millions and yet around 50% of re…

1099 income works roughly the same way in the states.

Re: Microsoft Irish subsidiary paid zero corporate tax on £220bn profit last year

#134

Post by rorykoehler »

yunohn wrote: post #129
rorykoehler wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

TIL. I thought absurdly high tax rates were a nordic specialty. NL seems very wealthy whenever I visit. Are median incomes substantially higher than surrounding countries?

The Netherlands is a tax haven for corporations. Individuals bear the brunt of ensuring a high QoL. Median income in 2021 is €36.500, so quite low tbh. The only kind of income you can avoid taxes on is capital gains - i.e. investing in stocks or real estate. Obviously this is not feasible for the general population, and as such, most people spend their entire monthly income on rent/mortgage, kids, and living expenses…

I have known many Dutch people over the years who have gotten a lot of benefits from the state from unemployment to housing. Some of it clearly fraudulently too. Seems to be unsustainable.

Re: Microsoft Irish subsidiary paid zero corporate tax on £220bn profit last year

#135

Post by Nextgrid »

benjaminwootton wrote: post #114
rorykoehler wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No one pays that much in a progressive tax system. Every time this discussion comes up people spout off these numbers but if you calculate out how much you actually pay it's probably in the 20-30% of total salary range. That's still high but it's just dishonest and makes people look like idiots when they throw around 40% etc. If you are truly paying 40% of your income in tax you are earning millions and are benefitin…

In the UK you pay a flat 40% over around £45k, no ambiguity whatsoever, then 45% over £150k. Not exactly millionaire status.

150k sounds very low when you take into account this tax rate and the property prices in London.

Re: Microsoft Irish subsidiary paid zero corporate tax on £220bn profit last year

#136

Post by KMag »

maccard wrote: post #46
malux85 wrote: post #2

I have to pay 40% of my income as income tax. I have HAD ENOUGH. This is infuriating. What can we do?

> I have to pay 40% of my income as income tax. So do all the engineers, PMs, etc working at Microsoft.

All of the MS engineers in the U.S. have an effective income tax rate of 40%, not a marginal tax rate of 40%? Assuming Washington State takes about 10% marginal tax... that's about half their income coming in above the 32% federal tax bracket which starts at $163k.

Is a starting salary for an engineer at Microsoft really around $320,000/yr.? If they're really pulling in that, one would hope they'd have some long-term capital gains, which would further pull down their effective income tax rate.

Re: Microsoft Irish subsidiary paid zero corporate tax on £220bn profit last year

#137

Post by macspoofing »

rorykoehler wrote: post #65

We should stop all taxation and use inflation to pay for everything instead. Much simpler and no one can get out of it.

>We should stop all taxation and use inflation to pay for everything instead. Much simpler and no one can get out of it.

You just buy assets, like stocks, gold, property, etc.

Re: Microsoft Irish subsidiary paid zero corporate tax on £220bn profit last year

#138

Post by seanmcdirmid »

yunohn wrote: post #116
rorykoehler wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is no tax free allowance in NL? Do you pay extra for healthcare or is it paid for out of that amount?

Healthcare is paid from post-tax income. As a single person, I pay approx. €150 monthly. There is also a deductible of €385-885, and choosing a lower amount means you pay more per month too. There is no tax free allowance. There is general/labor tax credit, but it’s incredibly minimal and reduces with income: * €2.837 for those with a taxable income under €21.043 * €2.837 - 5,977% x (taxable income - €21.043) for peo…

€150/month for healthcare? Ya, that could work lost tax. Switzerland also pays for health insurance premiums post tax, but they are nowhere that cheap.

Re: Microsoft Irish subsidiary paid zero corporate tax on £220bn profit last year

#139

Post by dkyc »

lukasm wrote: post #127
dkyc wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

FYI, this setup would be extremely beneficial to gigantic companies and likely would lead to immense consolidation, since effectively you would tax 1% on every supplier transaction down the chain, whereas the vertically integrated gigacompany would only pay 1% once.

nope this tax scheme would only apply to certain corporations e.g. Revenue 0-20mln EUR, you keep the existing tax scheme Revenue 20-100mln - you can choose the tax scheme Revenue 100mln+ - you have to tax revenue Thresholds are up for debate. Also, companies already pay around 0-5% of their revenue in income tax. Gigantic companies pay close to 0.

This doesn't change the fundamental fact that a tax on every transaction disincentives B2B transactions and therefore directly incentivizes large, vertically integrated companies.

You can try to work against it by arbitrary progressive taxation thresholds, but this doesn't change the underlying mathematics.

Also, there's a reason why progressive taxation isn't widely implemented for corporations, because it's very easy to circumvent by splitting up and increasing the number of legal entities. A sensible way around that is taxing the _ultimate beneficiary_ rather than the company itself (i.e. the owners as natural persons), which is what GP suggests with "sales tax and personal income tax on salaries and distributions".

Re: Microsoft Irish subsidiary paid zero corporate tax on £220bn profit last year

#140

Post by markus_zhang »

malux85 wrote: post #2

I have to pay 40% of my income as income tax. I have HAD ENOUGH. This is infuriating. What can we do?

You can't do much under the current instituitions. The elites of United States spent huge effort these hundreds of years to make sure that 1) Their income mostly relies on the United States as a financial/military beast, and 2) Whatever ordinary people suffer from, be it high tax or flood or lightning bolts, the elites will not be affected and can safely live in areas well protected.
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