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

Paradise Papers: Dear Tim Cook

projekte.sueddeutsche.de

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

191–200 of 817 posts

Re: Paradise Papers: Dear Tim Cook

#191

Post by loceng »

nickpp wrote: post #99
styx31 wrote: post #80

What annoys me the most is that, as a small company, I can't evade from my country tax system. I pay the taxes. All of them, at full rate. But there are these big companies which can afford to create offshore companies/holding just to evade some tax system, and lower their tax rate. So, what? The tax rate of a country is now "artificial", because it will never be applied to all revenues from all companies, because th…

By default, big companies always get preferential treatment from governments. Open a mega-factory? They get tax cuts, cheap real estate, free utilities. Why? Those shiny new jobs look great on a politician's resume for the next election... What does the little business guy get? A letter of "don't forget to pay your taxes in full or else" It's time to accept the fact that governments are NOT a fair and impartial warde…

You need a globally cohesive solution in order for this to happen. Countries part of the solution will need to play by the decided upon rules or not be able to participate in the economies of those in the agreement. It's as simple as that - of course the status quo exists being of bullies.

Re: Paradise Papers: Dear Tim Cook

#192

Post by blowski »

exDM69 wrote: post #76
JorgeGT wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Problem is, it was not a lot of patience what ended slavery in the US, it was a lot of violence.

And I'm afraid that it'll be a lot of violence ending tax evasion/optimization/avoidance too. The globalization game has winners and losers and it's starting to look like the losers outnumber the winners. I'd like to see something done to the global economy system with peaceful means before someone resorts to violence.

Arguably, some of the terrorism and other violent attacks are at least partially linked to globalisation. I doubt it's the winners driving trucks at people or shooting up churches.

Re: Paradise Papers: Dear Tim Cook

#193

Post by tallanvor »

brynx97 wrote: post #173
sschueller wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Same goes for US individuals living abroad not having any business relations or even holdings in the US. Yet they are required to file and pay US taxes in addition to local taxes.

You can apply for the foreign earned income tax exemption. I work abroad, and I reclaimed all my US taxes for my income earned abroad.

But you still have to file. No other western nation requires their citizens to file if they are living and working overseas for the full year.

Re: Paradise Papers: Dear Tim Cook

#194

Post by ajuc »

nickpp wrote: post #151
sfifs wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Those with wealth will always try to capture the system - whether its formal or informal. The natural state of any business is to try and become a monopoly because that maximizes rent taking ability - NOT competition. Practically the ONLY power able to stop monopolies from forming is the government. In absence of the government's ability to "meddle", businesses can and will cut deals with big competitors and squelch…

Monopolies are granted by governments. The free market has a natural solution to monopolies, it's called competition - startups. Big Cos will always lobby governments to add rules and regulation to raise the barrier of entry on their market and thus reduce competition. They, in fact, buy their monopoly from the government. Solution? Take away the government's ability to grant monopolies.

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

Re: Paradise Papers: Dear Tim Cook

#195

Post by dx034 »

lucozade wrote: post #92

As the "editor-in-chief of the Süddeutsche Zeitung, Germany’s leading daily", why not do something? I don't mean complain, that's already happening, I mean actually do something. For example, ban all Apple products from the paper. Lobby the German government to ban all Apple products until Apple pay a sufficient amount of tax. Use the paper's influence to get people to stop using Apple's services. That sort of someth…

> For example, ban all Apple products from the paper. Lobby the German government to ban all Apple products until Apple pay a sufficient amount of tax. Use the paper's influence to get people to stop using Apple's services. That sort of something.

Not sure if they even issue company phones. But if, that's maybe 100 iphones. And how should they lobby a government to ban iPhones? As official phones they're not used anyway (for security reasons) and the state has no say in what people use privately. Boycotts almost never work.

Re: Paradise Papers: Dear Tim Cook

#196

Post by crdoconnor »

cm2187 wrote: post #163
styx31 wrote: post #80

What annoys me the most is that, as a small company, I can't evade from my country tax system. I pay the taxes. All of them, at full rate. But there are these big companies which can afford to create offshore companies/holding just to evade some tax system, and lower their tax rate. So, what? The tax rate of a country is now "artificial", because it will never be applied to all revenues from all companies, because th…

All they are doing is arbitraging loopholes in the tax systems. Politicians have been trying to solve way too many problems by taxes (taxing differently x and y) or giving tax gifts to donors and various organised interests. As a result it creates an arbitrage-able tax system. I wouldn't point your annoyance to those who are optimising their taxes (after all this is merely their fiduciary duties to their share holder…

>All they are doing is arbitraging loopholes in the tax systems. Politicians have been trying to solve way too many problems by taxes (taxing differently x and y) or giving tax gifts to donors and various organised interests. As a result it creates an arbitrage-able tax system.

The loopholes themselves are gifts to friends, lobbyists and donors.

>I wouldn't point your annoyance to those who are optimising their taxes (after all this is merely their fiduciary duties to their share holders) but to the designers of this tax system.

Why are you pretending that those optimizing their taxes are not furiously lobbying to keep them "optimized"?

>Create a flat tax and pretty much all tax avoidance schemes disappear.

The flat tax is possibly the most regressive tax system ever conceived. If you want to reward owning for a living and punish working for a living then it's almost the perfect tax.

Re: Paradise Papers: Dear Tim Cook

#197

Post by mrlinx »

adventured wrote: post #88
almostarockstar wrote: post #60

As an Irish citizen, I feel embarrassed by the way we have dealt with Apple (and other behemoth corps). We simultaneously gave these organisations "free parking" and a "get out of jail free card". I don't blame Apple for taking advantage though. I would.

That free parking increased Ireland's economy by nearly six fold in a mere 25 years. It took Ireland from a second tier economy, to a first tier economic power ($300b in GDP with a mere 4.7m people). From sub $15,000 GDP per capita in 1993, to surpassing the US in GDP per capita at $62,000. You can tell it's the large foreign corporations causing it, because of the big gap between the growth in domestic income and th…

Apple and these other companies pay taxes in Ireland due to a duty to his shareholders. Ireland improves its economy 6 fold by undercutting all other EU countries on tax rates. And other countries are what, fucked out of tax money?

Re: Paradise Papers: Dear Tim Cook

#198

Post by dx034 »

cjsuk wrote: post #2

I think we can bitch all we like and nothing will happen. International taxation is complicated and part of a multinational's business model revolves around exploiting that for shareholder gain. What this points to is that we need a new global trade and taxation agreement for handling this. But the policy makers don't want that because they benefit from it. Ergo, it'll always be like this. At best you can add additio…

This is why the EU thinks about introducing a revenue based tax for tech companies. Cheating on profits is easy, cheating on revenues is close to impossible.

Re: Paradise Papers: Dear Tim Cook

#199

Post by pawelkomarnicki »

svennek wrote: post #123
auxym wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is in Canada, Europe...

But don't forget that those are third-rate (more like fourth-rate) countries, almost undeveloped brutes... (as an EU-citizen)

We don't even pay for our health bills in Germany when leaving a doctor's office ;-)

Re: Paradise Papers: Dear Tim Cook

#200

Post by yardie »

eru wrote: post #167
cm2187 wrote: post #163

Earlier quoted context omitted.

All they are doing is arbitraging loopholes in the tax systems. Politicians have been trying to solve way too many problems by taxes (taxing differently x and y) or giving tax gifts to donors and various organised interests. As a result it creates an arbitrage-able tax system. I wouldn't point your annoyance to those who are optimising their taxes (after all this is merely their fiduciary duties to their share holder…

A flat tax on income would help, but it's still a tax on income, and so you can move that around with clever transfer pricing etc. Land value tax works even better: it's physically impossible to move or hide land.

Somehow I doubt the person making $20k/year paying the government 20% would see it the same way as the person making $100k/year.
Post reply on HN