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Denmark: No aid for companies which pay out dividends or are reg. in tax havens

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Re: Denmark: No aid for companies which pay out dividends or are reg. in tax havens

#301

Post by chrisseaton »

throwaway2048 wrote: post #290
chrisseaton wrote: post #283

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> ...if such compensation (including dividends) was an obligation... But I don't think it's an obligation. Not sure where you're reading that from what I said. Sock compensation is often discretionary, and dividend payments as well. Not an obligation.

Then, Like I said, its nothing like salary, which is absolutely an obligation.

> Then, Like I said, its nothing like salary, which is absolutely an obligation.

But I'm never argued it was a salary or an obligation. Literally never used either of those two words. I think you're arguing against something nobody said.

It's money you'd be paying a person. It doesn't matter if it was 'like a salary' or an 'obligation' or not. What difference do you think that would make? Preventing companies paying dividends is prevent them paying people. Real people!

Re: Denmark: No aid for companies which pay out dividends or are reg. in tax havens

#302

Post by m-p-3 »

dang wrote: post #244

This submission broke HN's rules by editorializing the title. Doing that eventually causes your account to lose submission privileges on HN, so please don't do that. " Please use the original title, unless it is misleading or linkbait; don't editorialize. " https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html Cherry-picking a detail from an article and making that the title is editorializing—in fact it's the leading form…

To be honest, I wouldn't have opened the topic if the original title (Denmark Extends Business Aid to Increase Spending By $15 Billion) was used as this was somewhat uninteresting overall, "that companies which pay out dividends, buy back own shares or are registered in tax havens won’t be eligible for any of the aid programs" was the more interesting piece of information I might have otherwise skipped.

Re: Denmark: No aid for companies which pay out dividends or are reg. in tax havens

#303

Post by tidon12 »

I find these restrictions relatively frustrating because they push governments into an adversarial relationship with shareholders in a way that is unnecessary.

We may not like it much, but government equity purchases are a much more aligned way to pursue a bailout. World governments (and by proxy taxpayers) should be gaining ownership or preferred rights in these deals. Then shareholders could be free to do whatever ridiculous dividend / buyback policy they want. Putting time limited bans on corporate payouts doesn't fix the incentives that lead to high payout rates in the first place. Shareholders losing 80% of their equity in a bailout would.

Re: Denmark: No aid for companies which pay out dividends or are reg. in tax havens

#304

Post by 0xff00ffee »

0xff00ffee wrote: post #181
yalogin wrote: post #69

I keep saying over and over but the economic policy is something trump fucked up big time. He gave away the corporate tax breaks in times of prosperity when there was no need and the companies just made bank. He was dealt a great hand, a strong economy that would chug along no matter who the president was. Those are the times to focus on the poor and lift people up. Instead he wasted his opportunity on the tax cuts.…

Similarly: I don't understand the Oregon Kicker: if there is a surplus, it is sent back to the people. DUH! The point of a surplus is to save for emergencies! Sure, if there is more than, hm, let's use Chase bank: Six months savings, then send the rest back. But running a state with no emergency savings seems asinine, no? Unless... maybe a state can just go way into debt immediately if they need to in case of emergen…

I just learned it is illegal for many states to engage in deficit spending for emergencies:

"That’s in part because, in many cases, states are legally barred from deficit spending, which means in times of crisis, especially those producing huge budget shortfalls through collapsing tax revenue, they are functionally unable to respond at all. In such situations, the federal government is designed to serve as a backstop, but over and over again throughout this crisis, the White House has said states will get little to no help — that they are entirely on their own. (The federal medical stockpile isn’t meant for the states, as Jared Kushner has said, as though the country is anything more than its states.)"

This is why the Trump government stealing PPE supplies from states is so fucked up:

Source:

https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2020/04/hospitals-face-a-whi...

Re: Denmark: No aid for companies which pay out dividends or are reg. in tax havens

#305

Post by dang »

m-p-3 wrote: post #302
dang wrote: post #244

This submission broke HN's rules by editorializing the title. Doing that eventually causes your account to lose submission privileges on HN, so please don't do that. " Please use the original title, unless it is misleading or linkbait; don't editorialize. " https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html Cherry-picking a detail from an article and making that the title is editorializing—in fact it's the leading form…

To be honest, I wouldn't have opened the topic if the original title (Denmark Extends Business Aid to Increase Spending By $15 Billion) was used as this was somewhat uninteresting overall, "that companies which pay out dividends, buy back own shares or are registered in tax havens won’t be eligible for any of the aid programs" was the more interesting piece of information I might have otherwise skipped.

The answer to this is that the baitier title can help bootstrap an article onto the front page and that's not always bad. Once it's on the front page, that's enough of an indication that there might be something interesting about the article, so it's not going to damage it as much to restore the title. I tend not to include this point in top-level public comments because subtleties like this make the explanation too complicated.

I say "not always bad" but in the present case I do think it was bad, because there really isn't much of interest in the article. Even though the cherry-picked point was the more interesting detail, it only got a single sentence. That's not enough to support a non-generic discussion (https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que...).

Re: Denmark: No aid for companies which pay out dividends or are reg. in tax havens

#306

Post by klyrs »

kleiba wrote: post #300
klyrs wrote: post #174

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Bailouts are a reward. Not getting a reward is not a punishment. If you buy a lottery ticket and win, your neighbor was not punished for not buying a ticket.

That's just semantics. Whether you see it as a reward for some or a punishment for others is besides the point. The argument is about companies getting treated unequally with no just cause.

To spoonerize a colonial slogan, No representation without taxation.

Is there just cause to use tax money to help companies who have not paid taxes? Is that fair to the companies who put their money in that pot, to have it doled out to those who didn't? Should companies be treated equally, when they don't behave equally? Because I'm unconvinced that countries owe tax-dodgers a dime. I think that their employees, being taxpayers, should have a safety net in case their employers neither pay taxes nor save for a rainy day. Let this be a lesson to the executives and let their ventures fail.

Re: Denmark: No aid for companies which pay out dividends or are reg. in tax havens

#307

Post by kortilla »

RockIslandLine wrote: post #293
kortilla wrote: post #255

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The government can’t invent jobs that bring in more revenue than they cost though. If everyone does unsustainable jobs with printed money, you’ll have hyperinflation and then collapse. > If they fail, they fail, and the government can scoop up the workers This is a government forced failure. That’s a great way to turn every small business owner (a huge part of the middle class) against the pandemic containment effort…

"The government can’t invent jobs that bring in more revenue than they cost though." Why not? Is there some reason why a private medical researcher is somehow better than a government medical researcher?

Because a private medical researcher has to actually be funded. In other words, the expected value of the researcher is in excess of the researcher’s cost.

Nobody pays medical researchers without expecting an ROI unless it’s for a charity (in which case it’s funded by other excess value in the economy).

There isn’t really a meaningful difference between the government spending $100 to get $2 of value and spending $100 to get $0 of value. If we’re going down the unsustainable jobs path, it would be much easier to just pay everyone $80k/year to do nothing.

Re: Denmark: No aid for companies which pay out dividends or are reg. in tax havens

#308

Post by RockIslandLine »

kortilla wrote: post #307
RockIslandLine wrote: post #293

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"The government can’t invent jobs that bring in more revenue than they cost though." Why not? Is there some reason why a private medical researcher is somehow better than a government medical researcher?

Because a private medical researcher has to actually be funded. In other words, the expected value of the researcher is in excess of the researcher’s cost. Nobody pays medical researchers without expecting an ROI unless it’s for a charity (in which case it’s funded by other excess value in the economy). There isn’t really a meaningful difference between the government spending $100 to get $2 of value and spending $10…

"In other words, the expected value of the researcher is in excess of the researcher’s cost."

So what magical property of being hired by a government destroys that expected value?

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