Earlier quoted context omitted.
>so any type of tax is justified? That's a straw man. You're leaping from "some type of tax is justified" which is quite a bit more reasonable than "any tax". And if you want to say it's a slippery slope or some such, well, ever single action if extrapolated to the extreme can be a viewed as such. If 3% is reasonable and then it's proposed to goes up and up, fight the increase, not the initial reasonable action. Of c…
All taxes are a slippery slope. Name one that has ever been repealed. Income tax in the U.S. started out as a modest 3% on only the highest incomes and look where that has ended up: full on wealth redistribution. We can argue whether that's a good thing or not, but not whether there's a slippery slope when it comes to implementing a new tax.
France has approved a digital services tax despite threats of retaliation by US
321–330 of 501 posts
Re: France has approved a digital services tax despite threats of retaliation by US
#322Re: France has approved a digital services tax despite threats of retaliation by US
#323Amazon should and probably will just raise prices for French shoppers.
Re: France has approved a digital services tax despite threats of retaliation by US
#324Very interesting comments that reflects the difference of values between french and north americans!
Re: France has approved a digital services tax despite threats of retaliation by US
#325Part of me originally wanted the US to retaliate since this theoretically threatens my paycheck, but a 3% tax on revenue generated within the country is pretty low and seems reasonable considering how ineffective taxing profits is due to loopholes. I really don't think it's sour grapes so much as trying to address the Irish/Luxembourgish tax schemes
to be more clear, perhaps they could demand those taxes from Ireland, or Luxembourg where amazon is. This is like california taxing startups because they are based in Delaware.
Re: France has approved a digital services tax despite threats of retaliation by US
#326Earlier quoted context omitted.
> All money made on the white market in any country is facilitated by that government, and taxes are paid on all profits to pay for the services which allowed the profit to be made. So any taxation is justified? > It's not arbitrary to expect businesses to pay for services they benefit from. Any digital company with revenue of more than €750m ($850m; £670m) - of which at least €25m is generated in France - would be s…
> That sounds arbitrary. Administrative burden limits are not arbitrary. They are used in many places all over the world.
That does not make it not arbitrary, there is no logic in that statement.
Re: France has approved a digital services tax despite threats of retaliation by US
#327Earlier quoted context omitted.
that's the point the French are bringing up. French companies pay French taxes. Internet companies serve French markets, take French money, but pay taxes elsewhere, and often they pay no taxes because they can shop around to find a friendly tax haven that doesn't charge them taxes. This is only possible because internet. So, they're imposing a tax on companies that serve French customers via the internet but aren't b…
Why isn't the solution then to force all companies doing business in France to register with the French government and pay taxes on the portion of revenues derived from France?
How do you think the tax system works?
As soon as you do business,you have to register yourself to the "tax office"..
Now you structure you company in such a way, that the company pays more money for the trademarks of your partner company, than you make.
Now of course, that is something a small company with 50 people can't do.
So the company with 50 people can't make ends meet, and the company which makes 200 million, continous to make money hand over fist.
Re: France has approved a digital services tax despite threats of retaliation by US
#328Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Those large tech companies can make money in France because the french government provides all that is necessary for a free, fair and functioning market. How could Google make money in France if there was no french police force, education system, market regulation, court system, contract enforcement? Ignoring for a moment that this rationale can support any tax policy at all (including 100% tax rates)... This holds…
Because these large tech companies don't pay taxes currently. The current tax laws have a huge loophole in respect to large foreign internet businesses. Now they're trying to close that loophole.
I think it is impossible to sell anything in the EU without VAT, which is a much higher taxation rate than profit (not as percentage, but as money: VAT is 20-25% of the product or service price, profit can be as low as 1-5%.
What the likes of Amazon, Google or Facebook are not paying is profit tax, pretending they have no profits. French companies that have no profits also don't pay profit tax.
Re: France has approved a digital services tax despite threats of retaliation by US
#329Earlier quoted context omitted.
You missed the question. why is France charging tax to these particular companies? As opposed to all companies? Your answer makes no distinction between them so doesn't actually answer the question.
Companies providing services in France typically pay VAT, corporate income taxes or similar. This tax is specifically on revenue that doesn't do that. (Not that I am a proponent of this tax)
One cannot sell adds to French companies without paying VAT. That is plain illegal and there is no way to go around it, it's on the invoice.
Re: France has approved a digital services tax despite threats of retaliation by US
#330Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Are you sure it's "an unfair advantage" and not just "an advantage"? Having the option to not comply with laws, is an unfair advantage. >reduce or remove corporate tax and raise sales tax or similar VAT is a sales tax, effectively, but even that is managed away fairly easy. It's an efficient tax, but when it comes to B2B activity it's effectively unpaid. Amazon, though is a retailer, has a very large amount of B2B…
> Having the option to not comply with laws, is an unfair advantage. All parties in this scenario are legally compliant. > VAT is a sales tax, effectively, but even that is managed away fairly easy. It's an efficient tax, but when it comes to B2B activity it's effectively unpaid. Amazon, though is a retailer, has a very large amount of B2B business. How does its B2B business help Amazon evade taxes? When I think abou…
> All parties in this scenario are legally compliant.
They were complaint with the letter of the law, but the law makers decided that the companies were not complaint with the original spirit of the law. So they introduced a new law so that all parties can also be complaint with the spirit.
In software engineering terms, the written down code was not producing intended behavior. So new code has been written to deal with this bug.