Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

France, Germany, Italy, Spain seek to base taxes on digital giants' revenues

reuters.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

131–140 of 195 posts

Re: France, Germany, Italy, Spain seek to base taxes on digital giants' revenues

#131

Post by seanmcdirmid »

Nokinside wrote: post #56
justinmk wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Taxation could be used as natural pressure to correct market failures. Taxation isn't natural. By the way, I'd like to remind everyone: when the state taxes something, the state now depends on that thing for its budget. > If retail company that has 30% market share pays 0.3% extra from its revenue compared to tiny company with just 10,000 customers, it would probably be enough to even out the field and limit barrie…

I run business in Finland and pay high taxes. Friction is not the taxes. If it were, I would have moved my business to Estonia long time ago, it's just few hours away. I could do it over internet in few hours and start within days. There are different ways for countries compete as "business platforms". I'm not saying that some way is better than another, what I'm saying is that there are different strategies that can…

Chinese tax rates are not low. Only the base is lower, but taxes in china actually wind up being quite high.

Re: France, Germany, Italy, Spain seek to base taxes on digital giants' revenues

#132

Post by seanmcdirmid »

Atropos wrote: post #40
microcolonel wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Which infrastructure? What infrastructure in France, Germany, Italy, or Spain, which is used by Google to reach their customers, is built and/or maintained by the governments of those countries?

The legal system and independent courts etc are an infrastructure it depends on - Google had to leave China due to problems with the local legal system

Google has to leave china for political reasons. The legal system rather is incredibly malleable to the needs of officials (lots of Chinese internet companies are allowed to ignore laws that foreign companies are not).

Re: France, Germany, Italy, Spain seek to base taxes on digital giants' revenues

#133

Post by zdkl »

MarkMc wrote: post #114
sddfd wrote: post #16

This is not about taxing revenues instead of profits. This is about taxing EU-wide profits in EU countries proportional to the revenues generated in that country. At the moment, many big tech companies use bookkeeping tricks to make it look like all their profit is generated in, for example, Ireland, while the revenue is generated in other EU counties. Unfortunately, Ireland has special tax rates for these companies…

It depends how you define profit, and to me this is absolutely about taxing revenues instead of profit. I see profit as the 'value added' by a particular activity. At least 90% of the value created by Google, Facebook and Apple was created in California. Therefore the vast majority of worldwide income generated by these companies should be subject to the tax rates that apply in California - not Ireland, not Germany,…

> At least 90% of the value created by Google, Facebook and Apple was created in California.

I'm trying not to be snarky but I need to say wtf.

FB & google don't make money from IP, they make money as service providers, connecting merchants on the advertisement hype train to our eyeballs.

They take money from local and transnational businesses, and present ads, aggregation and search services to individual, local, users.

How is this California related profits when I see ads for $smallbusiness in my french town? Because they host the servers there? Please. To be fair I'd concede Amazon may be different with regards to where the value they create resides but I'm sure you'll feel the same way I do when the tech giants step away from Silicon valley and it looses the sweet sweet techmonies.

This not about IP rights, corporate liberties or socialism, it's about realising when you're defending the fire that's roasting you. 'Cause google and fb don't give a F about US vs EU further than how they can leverage them to lower operating costs.

Re: France, Germany, Italy, Spain seek to base taxes on digital giants' revenues

#134

Post by thescribe »

KGIII wrote: post #96
justinmk wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Taxation could be used as natural pressure to correct market failures. Taxation isn't natural. By the way, I'd like to remind everyone: when the state taxes something, the state now depends on that thing for its budget. > If retail company that has 30% market share pays 0.3% extra from its revenue compared to tiny company with just 10,000 customers, it would probably be enough to even out the field and limit barrie…

Taxation may not be natural, but it is inherent in a society. To explain, you give some of your kill to the tribe. You share with your family, to provide for them. In return, you get a tribe or family. The independent person without obligation to return to the social good is largely a myth and, if done, would mean extinction. Additionally, I don't mind paying my taxes. I do mind how my taxes are spent. They are the c…

Taxes may be inherent to society, but so is crime. I believe we have a moral obligation to minimize both.

Re: France, Germany, Italy, Spain seek to base taxes on digital giants' revenues

#135

Post by microcolonel »

llukas wrote: post #129
Spivak wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So if you operate a business in any country that has a treaty with France you should get a bill from the French government?

If you offer services in France and accept payments from French citizens then you're pretty much operating in France. If not someone should figure out how to put a server on a satellite so they could claim no taxes are due as transaction is extraterrestrial.

That would be exactly true. If your business's operating legal presence were in space, or on the open ocean, then you would pay no taxes, aside from consumption-side taxes in the countries you serve.

Tell me how this would be anything but fair.

Re: France, Germany, Italy, Spain seek to base taxes on digital giants' revenues

#136

Post by Iv »

halad wrote: post #116
Iv wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is one of the main criticism about how the EU was made: freedom for funds goods and (mostly) workers to move around in the EU zone, without tariffs or constraints but no fiscal harmonization has been done. Therefore countries with low taxes (Ireland but also Luxembourg) attract a disproportionate amount of big companies HQ. Ikea, for instance, is officially declared in Luxembourg. Why so many people in EU rejoic…

Being an economic liberal, I always thought that this was one of the main advantages of the EU. Setup shop in one country and sell to the whole single market while encouraging beneficial tax competition. I do oppose special deals for specific companies though. Ireland, please stand up to the Brussels cartel!

What is the advantage of tax competition? Small countries that only host headquarters can charge very low rates: they don't have most of the expenses of bigger countries, especially if they are under no military threat by their neighbors and therefore protected by them.

Re: France, Germany, Italy, Spain seek to base taxes on digital giants' revenues

#137

Post by lovich »

zdkl wrote: post #109
rtpg wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Isn't this a misrepresentation of the global state? I think the corporate tax rate in France is 33% of profits, which isn't far from 35% Not sure how state tax rates interact with the federal one though

Keep in mind we're the last effectively communist country in the world, I'm not surprised in the least to see corporate taxes up there with the "banana republics" gp was talking about. "Social" money has to come from somewhere!

I don't believe I've ever heard France described as a communist country before

Re: France, Germany, Italy, Spain seek to base taxes on digital giants' revenues

#138

Post by markvdb »

jaredklewis wrote: post #97
sddfd wrote: post #16

This is not about taxing revenues instead of profits. This is about taxing EU-wide profits in EU countries proportional to the revenues generated in that country. At the moment, many big tech companies use bookkeeping tricks to make it look like all their profit is generated in, for example, Ireland, while the revenue is generated in other EU counties. Unfortunately, Ireland has special tax rates for these companies…

If this system is enacted, will the benefits of staying in the EU out weigh just moving all the shell companies to the Caymans or wherever? I wish countries would give up on corporate taxes. They are either easily circumvented, or you need a massive regulatory body to analyze all corporate transactions and determine if they are "fair." All the same tax revenue can be gained through much better systems that are not tr…

Much of the profit generated in the EU by these multinationals actually ends up largely untaxed in Bermuda/Cayman islands/... subsidiaries.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Double_Irish_arrangement

Re: France, Germany, Italy, Spain seek to base taxes on digital giants' revenues

#139

Post by markvdb »

hkmurakami wrote: post #79
csomar wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you explain what are these tricks? Asking for a friend. A link is fine too.

It's been widely reported on by major news outlets over the years. Dutch Sandwitch (now defunct?) was one of them.

The double Irish with a Dutch sandwich is still available and actively being used until 2020.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Double_Irish_arrangement

Re: France, Germany, Italy, Spain seek to base taxes on digital giants' revenues

#140

Post by KGIII »

thescribe wrote: post #134
KGIII wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Taxation may not be natural, but it is inherent in a society. To explain, you give some of your kill to the tribe. You share with your family, to provide for them. In return, you get a tribe or family. The independent person without obligation to return to the social good is largely a myth and, if done, would mean extinction. Additionally, I don't mind paying my taxes. I do mind how my taxes are spent. They are the c…

Taxes may be inherent to society, but so is crime. I believe we have a moral obligation to minimize both.

I kinda like the idea of a well-funded government. Maybe it's just me?

Note: This doesn't mean I agree with how they spend it.

Post reply on HN