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G20 agrees to push ahead with digital tax

reuters.com

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Re: G20 agrees to push ahead with digital tax

#71

Post by norswap »

malvosenior wrote: post #69
GolDDranks wrote: post #5

"The U.S. government has voiced concern in the past that the European campaign for a “digital tax” unfairly targets U.S. tech giants." How about admitting that the U.S. tech giants unfairly use their monopolistic powers because the Internet has become a winner-takes-it-all economy.

I think it's notable that none of the "winners" are European tech startups. They're all from the US. One could argue that because the US focuses on innovation and Europe seems to be focusing on legislation that the latter will always be chasing the former. If instead of making it more difficult to build technology products, Europe focused on making it easier maybe the would be able to provide some much needed competi…

Yes, of course that is the only criteria at play. This tweet is entirely correct. There is absoluuuutely no way there are other issues to be considered. Nope!

Re: G20 agrees to push ahead with digital tax

#72

Post by malvosenior »

norswap wrote: post #71
malvosenior wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it's notable that none of the "winners" are European tech startups. They're all from the US. One could argue that because the US focuses on innovation and Europe seems to be focusing on legislation that the latter will always be chasing the former. If instead of making it more difficult to build technology products, Europe focused on making it easier maybe the would be able to provide some much needed competi…

Yes, of course that is the only criteria at play. This tweet is entirely correct. There is absoluuuutely no way there are other issues to be considered. Nope!

Of course there are multiple issues at play, this is one of them. Are you proposing that the extra layers of legislation around technology companies don't hamper innovation?

Re: G20 agrees to push ahead with digital tax

#73

Post by dsfyu404ed »

nolok wrote: post #62
dsfyu404ed wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Costs get passed on to buyers and eventually to consumers. They might get diluted along the way but they do get passed on.

... Except you then realize that in Google and Facebook's case the end user you think of is not the customer/consumer those costs will be passed on. EDIT: downvoting me doesn't change the fact that those 2 don't make their money by charging you and me their users, they charge advertisers who want to show us ads and get our data. If a cost needs to be passed on, it will be passed on them.

Those advertisers will pass the cost onto their customers. This is consumer facing advertising we're talking about. The people the advertisers pass their cost on to are the consumers, the people buying their products and services.

Re: G20 agrees to push ahead with digital tax

#74

Post by [deleted] »

jakeogh wrote: post #67
Daishiman wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Given that the vast majority of government employment happens in education, health care, transportation services and utilities, the part where "large government" is of actual concern to me has _very_ little to do with its actual cash flow and employment numbers and a lot to do with crappy regulatory environments.

What about the part where a large section of the population has a vested interest in growing gov, while at the same time (as in the link I provided) being unable to criticize it? It's not like you are going to go on and argue it's efficient or something... This is all rather moot. The EU's days are numbered.

[deleted]

Re: G20 agrees to push ahead with digital tax

#75

Post by cameronbrown »

kingnothing wrote: post #42
FDSGSG wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Facebook has a plenty of competition in the social media space, Apple certainly isn't the only hardware manufacturer, Amazon has competition everywhere and so does Netflix. Google hardly runs the only ad network. None of these companies are taking it all.

Facebook controls 70% of social media Amazon has 50% of all e-commerce spend in the US. Netflix put Blockbuster and every other movie rental store out of business. It currently has 50% of all video streaming traffic in the US. Google has 80% of the search market. I'm not so sure about what Apple monopolizes, but they do have a duopoly in the app store space with Google.

> Google has 80% of the search market. Facebook controls 70% of social media.

Wrong way to think about this. If you talk about advertising monopoly, sure. But you'd be hard-pressed to make an argument on a monopoly of free products.

> Netflix put Blockbuster and every other movie rental store out of business.

That's because Blockbuster was, quite frankly, shit. They failed to adapt to the internet. So what? Times move on. Netflix is far far better for consumers.

Something isn't a monopoly just because it's popular.

Re: G20 agrees to push ahead with digital tax

#76

Post by mfatica »

kingnothing wrote: post #42
FDSGSG wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Facebook has a plenty of competition in the social media space, Apple certainly isn't the only hardware manufacturer, Amazon has competition everywhere and so does Netflix. Google hardly runs the only ad network. None of these companies are taking it all.

Facebook controls 70% of social media Amazon has 50% of all e-commerce spend in the US. Netflix put Blockbuster and every other movie rental store out of business. It currently has 50% of all video streaming traffic in the US. Google has 80% of the search market. I'm not so sure about what Apple monopolizes, but they do have a duopoly in the app store space with Google.

> Amazon has 50% of all e-commerce spend in the US.

So 50% == all?

Re: G20 agrees to push ahead with digital tax

#77

Post by pergadad »

malvosenior wrote: post #69
GolDDranks wrote: post #5

"The U.S. government has voiced concern in the past that the European campaign for a “digital tax” unfairly targets U.S. tech giants." How about admitting that the U.S. tech giants unfairly use their monopolistic powers because the Internet has become a winner-takes-it-all economy.

I think it's notable that none of the "winners" are European tech startups. They're all from the US. One could argue that because the US focuses on innovation and Europe seems to be focusing on legislation that the latter will always be chasing the former. If instead of making it more difficult to build technology products, Europe focused on making it easier maybe the would be able to provide some much needed competi…

There's some first mover advantage and some country/language limitations that can bring up costs, but the main reason is actually the easy availability of cash in the US. Successful European companies, especially startups, are bought by US players. Think Skype or Minecraff: successful European startups bought by a US giant (Microsoft). More poignantly, the VC money allows companies to exist that really shouldn't, and they in turn crowd out smaller less-funded competitors that stem from other markets. Think Uber and Lyft - two giant unprofitable startups that exist because of VC investment to burn. Or Bird. Or ..

Funny enough, that's the two strategies that US companies/gov complain the Chinese are doing.

That said, there are a few big European players, such as on mobile games (king digital), network infrastructure (Nokia), etc. Just not as significant name brand value in the anglophone world.

Re: G20 agrees to push ahead with digital tax

#78

Post by twoodfin »

VLM wrote: post #7

The best traditional HN bad car analogy I can provide is Illinois State DOR is angry the new car factories are relocated in the rural south where the property taxes are low and what tax they do pay goes to the locals and not Illinois DOR, and they're selling those "foreign" cars in Illinois, so Illinois is going to add a special registration tax for cars registered but not manufactured in Illinois. This is kinda a ba…

It would also never survive Constitutional scrutiny, as it’s a blatant violation of the Commerce Clause. States can’t impose import duties, however disguised.

Re: G20 agrees to push ahead with digital tax

#79

Post by Daishiman »

jakeogh wrote: post #67
Daishiman wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Given that the vast majority of government employment happens in education, health care, transportation services and utilities, the part where "large government" is of actual concern to me has _very_ little to do with its actual cash flow and employment numbers and a lot to do with crappy regulatory environments.

What about the part where a large section of the population has a vested interest in growing gov, while at the same time (as in the link I provided) being unable to criticize it? It's not like you are going to go on and argue it's efficient or something... This is all rather moot. The EU's days are numbered.

> What about the part where a large section of the population has a vested interest in growing gov, while at the same time (as in the link I provided) being unable to criticize it?

You mean where the user also invoked the right to be forgotten? You mean like how background checks used to happen in the past too and where writing a letter to your newspaper about something counts for exactly the same? You mean like how this disfunction has literally nothing to do with government size and everything to do with a government's tolerance for political expression, regardless of its size?

> It's not like you are going to go on and argue it's efficient or something...

Efficiency has zero to do with this. Private companies can do this just as much as government institutions. You conflate issues of the state with issues that generally apply to any institution, whether public, private, large, small, for-profit or non-profit.

> This is all rather moot. The EU's days are numbered.

You keep telling yourself that.

Re: G20 agrees to push ahead with digital tax

#80

Post by dang »

arcbyte wrote: post #28
nicoburns wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Companies pay taxes because they use resources and services provided in a given country (roads and other infrastructure, police protection, courts, etc.). That's one view. Another is that they pay taxes simply because they have resources that society needs. If Facebook is trading in the UK (benefitting from access to the UK market, then I think it is reasonable that they pay tax in the UK).

> they pay taxes simply because they have resources that society needs That is called theft, is not a view of any kind, and the prevention of which is literally the reason "society" was formed in the first place

Please don't post generic ideological comments to HN. Such discussions are all the same, therefore boring, therefore off topic here.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

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