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Global minimum corporate tax: 130 nations to support U.S. proposal

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Re: Global minimum corporate tax: 130 nations to support U.S. proposal

#181

The idea that politicians and bureaucracies can defer to external international conventions to be the bad-cop for wildly unpopular policy decisions - and then claim to be powerless to stop them - is anathema to democratic principles like national representation, consent of the governed, and other concepts of human rights. This proposal seems like a global group of government affiliated people colluding to fleece each…

While it may be a cowardly way to divert responsibility I don't agree that this is so bad. This problem can only be solved by cooperating, otherwise companies can just shop around for the cheapest taxation rate.

What's wrong with that?

Re: Global minimum corporate tax: 130 nations to support U.S. proposal

#182
post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

colluding: to act together secretly or illegally in order to deceive or cheat someone. And please: capital flight being the results of abusive policy? Corporations and wealthy individuals will always try to avoid giving the fair share to the society that enabled their wealth in the first place: the case where wealth moves because of abusive policies is so marginal in the ocean of pure greed. Some countries are fiscal…

The fair share is defined by tax law. It's not some additional amount.

Notice how fair share is never actually stated...

How much of your time should you be forced to devote to others - the majority of government spending is on social programs. 1 day a week, 2 days a week?

What's the fair share? I'd say it's actually far lower than current tax rates.

Re: Global minimum corporate tax: 130 nations to support U.S. proposal

#183

Next year the US will spend $715 billion on military budget alone, a $10 billion increase from last year. Shouldn't the government try to cut spending before thinking of how it could increase tax revenue? It's like an obese person wanting to lose weight while eating more each year and thinking of increasing time spent at the gym to make up for it, shouldn't they try eating less if they want to lose weight?

No. Losing weight might read as being weaker. Why would any gov want that?

Re: Global minimum corporate tax: 130 nations to support U.S. proposal

#184

I rather we all agree to stop printing money.

The comment is correct: printing the money is actually taxing the poorest: because government spends money inefficiently, and printed money end up in the richest (and worse than that, corrupt and counterproductive) people pockets.

Like if you tax a next Bezos, you will have no next Amazon.

But if you stop printing money, you will take money from some government contractor, who is a friend of a senator.

Re: Global minimum corporate tax: 130 nations to support U.S. proposal

#185
post #148

The complexity of this agreement and its execution are incredible. Not only getting alignment from 130 members, but a system by which companies report their revenue _and the cost of the revenue_ for every country! Future tax avoidance schemes will most likely try to "divert" their costs towards high-revenue countries like the US. After all, what is the profit margin of an iPhone sold in Romania? For some context, cor…

You are mistaken. It's not that complicated and does not work that way. 1) No foreign country is required to collect minimum tax. 2) If some country is not collecting minimum tax, home country tops up the tax until minimum tax requirement is fulfilled. 3) It's up to the company to show evidence that it paid minimum tax in other countries so that it's not double taxed in country where it's hq is. 4) They need to repor…

Thanks for clarifying

Re: Global minimum corporate tax: 130 nations to support U.S. proposal

#186

Next year the US will spend $715 billion on military budget alone, a $10 billion increase from last year. Shouldn't the government try to cut spending before thinking of how it could increase tax revenue? It's like an obese person wanting to lose weight while eating more each year and thinking of increasing time spent at the gym to make up for it, shouldn't they try eating less if they want to lose weight?

This is not about increasing tax revenue it is about preventing multinationals from evading taxes. It's similar in concept to the Alternative Minimum Tax, which was designed to prevent an ever-increasing web of exemptions and loopholes from allowing some people to pay little-to-no taxes.

Taxes aren't a virtue - they're a necessary evil. They're coercion, only paid on the threat of violence. We should be aiming to minimize taxes and fund programs through other voluntary means. So where the money is being spent should be considered when talking about how much should be raised, since it the cause.

Re: Global minimum corporate tax: 130 nations to support U.S. proposal

#187

Next year the US will spend $715 billion on military budget alone, a $10 billion increase from last year. Shouldn't the government try to cut spending before thinking of how it could increase tax revenue? It's like an obese person wanting to lose weight while eating more each year and thinking of increasing time spent at the gym to make up for it, shouldn't they try eating less if they want to lose weight?

The military budget is a red herring. If the budget was reduced to zero it would barely effect the deficit, yet over the long term it would probably cost more, since a weak nation invites war.

Re: Global minimum corporate tax: 130 nations to support U.S. proposal

#188

The idea that politicians and bureaucracies can defer to external international conventions to be the bad-cop for wildly unpopular policy decisions - and then claim to be powerless to stop them - is anathema to democratic principles like national representation, consent of the governed, and other concepts of human rights. This proposal seems like a global group of government affiliated people colluding to fleece each…

I don't think this is a very good characterisation at all.

Nations don't have a lot of control over what goes on outside their borders. They can try, but it's hard.

So you end up with weird 'race to the bottom' scenarios where everyone is trying to out-do one another with lower rates i.e. a giant prisoner's dilemma.

Something needs to be done collectively to sort out the problem and this kind of activity is how it's done.

This effort is not about 'fleecing' it's more or less trying to but a lower bound on corporations ability to avoid paying taxes.

It's the opposite of 'not serving their citizens' - it's making sure that taxation is applied to international corps in some consistent way.

I don't think 'conspiracy theorists' have been talking about this one.

Re: Global minimum corporate tax: 130 nations to support U.S. proposal

#189

The idea that politicians and bureaucracies can defer to external international conventions to be the bad-cop for wildly unpopular policy decisions - and then claim to be powerless to stop them - is anathema to democratic principles like national representation, consent of the governed, and other concepts of human rights. This proposal seems like a global group of government affiliated people colluding to fleece each…

Raising corporate taxes is generally popular, not "wildly unpopular." For example, in a recent poll 65% of Americans support raising corporate taxes [1]. This number has been fairly steady over time. It's even higher when you ask about closing loopholes that allow international tax havens, as this 15% minimum tax agreement is trying to do--70-85% support [2]. The only terrible shame here is you laundering your opinio…

Ye we support raising taxes on the overlords…. Let’s vote on that.
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