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

G7: Rich nations back deal to tax multinationals

bbc.co.uk

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

871–880 of 931 posts

Re: G7: Rich nations back deal to tax multinationals

#871

Post by avianlyric »

nickpp wrote: post #190
avianlyric wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is such crap. While in theory you’re right, it ignores the biggest difference. With politicians ever person only gets one vote, theoretically equal power to force change. With corporations, the number of votes a person gets is directly related to their bank balance. There’s no such thing as equal power for the people, only the rich get to vote.

That is exactly how we got the planet to its current state: if you give more power to the numbers you'll encourage more numbers. Maybe it's time to give more weight to another human accomplishment than reproduction, like to the value created. But I don't hear governments giving more voting rights to more populous countries, instead it's to the "more developed" (PIB) and "more powerful" (military) both proxies for wea…

Well that’s clearly not true. Not sure if you noticed but most democratic developed countries are on the verge of population decline.

Not to mention a big chunk of human progress happened well before the development of democracy. Actually the worst aspects of human development seem to have been driving primarily by greed and wealth accumulation. The thing you seem to be advocating for.

Re: G7: Rich nations back deal to tax multinationals

#872

Post by gambiting »

walshemj wrote: post #868
gambiting wrote: post #849

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've received shares several times from the company where I work in the UK and every single time they have been taxed as income. If you are just given shares straight up then yes, they are subject to income tax on their worth at the time of acquisition.

They didn't bother to set up an HMRC approved scheme? Where these US companies? employee share holders in the USA really get screwed

I'm not sure what you mean? At the point of acquisition if you are given shares worth say £10k, it's the same as being given £10k cash, or £10k gift of some sort - you pay income tax based on the value of what you were given. It's different if you were given options - then the difference between your purchase price and sale price is taxed as capital gains with separate rules.

And no, it's a British company .

Re: G7: Rich nations back deal to tax multinationals

#873

Post by refurb »

dingaling wrote: post #817
refurb wrote: post #792

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Two companies with $100M in revenue, one with 2% margin and one with 50% margin. You’d fine then the same amount?

> You’d fine then the same amount? Progressive fines on people are based on their income, not how much they have left in the bank at the end of the month.

Sure, but expenses don’t vary a much for people versus companies.

You don’t meet many people who make $1M in a year who have unavoidable expenses of $900k.

Re: G7: Rich nations back deal to tax multinationals

#874

Post by nanis »

occamrazor wrote: post #712
rayiner wrote: post #645

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your analogy is flawed because you seem to be assuming that the people with execution authority are the ones who reached an agreement in principle. You’d expect them to succeed in papering it up. That’s not the case here. The agreement in principle was reached by someone who has no power to do anything with regards to corporate taxes. Congress sets U.S. tax law and agrees to treaties. To do that, you need 60% or 66%…

There are actually many steps. In this case: 1. The finance ministers reach an agreement. This is what has happened. 2. A treaty is written and signed, normally by the head of state, but sometimes by the head of government (for the US in both cases the President). At this point the treaty in not yet legally binding, although according to international law the signatory country has an obligation "to refrain, in good f…

> At this point the treaty in not yet legally binding, although according to international law the signatory country has an obligation "to refrain, in good faith, from acts that would defeat the object and the purpose of the treaty."

International "law" is always entertaining like this: Who enforces this "obligation"?

Re: G7: Rich nations back deal to tax multinationals

#875

Post by bumby »

anoncake wrote: post #801
bumby wrote: post #701

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just to underscore what was previously stated, I think this philosophy would drastically change the paradigm. I’m guessing it would severely restrict the money flowing into stocks which would have repercussions in other areas like pensions etc. Point being, I don’t think it can just be layered onto the existing system without serious blowback.

As I wrote, there could be an exception for non-voting stock. At least temporarily. But ultimately, it's supposed to change the paradigm. Because currently the economy is run by paperclip maximizers that no human is held responsible for. Which is not ideal.

Non voting shares are a minority already. Combine that with the fact that literally trillions of dollars would be aligned against such a idea, i fear it unfortunately relegates it to a thought experiment rather than a pragmatic policy proposal.

Re: G7: Rich nations back deal to tax multinationals

#877

Post by runarberg »

heliodor wrote: post #813
runarberg wrote: post #518

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Indeed. Which is the reason why my conclusion was opposite to the opinion. The real world gets in the way of it being practical. But in my ideal world inheritance is considered income and is taxed as such. And on a logistical curve a billionaire inheritance is taxed really close to 100%. Anybody that has earned so much money they no longer need to work has paid as much in taxes (and continue to do so as interest is t…

Wow, that's some pretty dystopian stuff.

Dystopian only to the wealthy class. Utopian for those of us who will never see an income (inherited or otherwise) above the average income.

Re: G7: Rich nations back deal to tax multinationals

#878

Post by bumby »

throwaway34241 wrote: post #823
jfengel wrote: post #586

Earlier quoted context omitted.

VAT plus UBI does save problems for the poor, but it's still regressive. The net effect is to put the main burden on the middle class.

I don't know if Yang's math checks out, but I think his proposal was $1000/mo and a 10% VAT. So the breakeven point would be $120k spending on taxable items/yr for an individual, or $240k spending/yr for a couple, with people below that coming out ahead and above coming out behind. Where you draw the line for "middle class" is somewhat arbitrary - I think you could be middle class and still earn over $120k, especiall…

>Where you draw the line for "middle class" is somewhat arbitrary

It’s a convention so, yes, it’s arbitrary (and people tend to change that definition to fit their points, and of course it’s relative to COL) but the most widely used definition is the middle quintiles. I believe this puts the upper bound around $120k for a household (not individual) in the US.

And you’re right, most people do consider themselves middle class. Some studies show as much as 90% of people think they are middle class which, unless we use a very loose statistical definition, is obviously false. The problem is people subjectively compare their life to their own peer group rather than society as a whole, so they are misled about defining the societal norm.

Re: G7: Rich nations back deal to tax multinationals

#879

Post by devdas »

skissane wrote: post #825
anfilt wrote: post #819

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nations are sovereign they can do what they want. Short of going to war its hard to force a country todo something it does not want too. Although if you pull out of agreement don't expect the other country to continue following it. Also there are other countries not part of this talk nothings stops a company from setting up there and doing the same tax games. So i dont see how this idea does anything

> Nations are sovereign they can do what they want. Short of going to war its hard to force a country todo something it does not want too In today's world economic pressure is a much bigger factor than war. If you upset enough countries, they can all start imposing trade and financial sanctions on you, which then ruins your economy. International law is a useful (even though of course not always perfect) guide in ans…

The major economies are also large sources of these loopholes.

Re: G7: Rich nations back deal to tax multinationals

#880

Post by refurb »

intricatedetail wrote: post #869
sokoloff wrote: post #862

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Transfer pricing is an accounting practice that is required by regulations to be computed/stated in many circumstances. Transfer pricing is not on its own an illegal practice as suggested above.

In the UK if an individual gets paid with a loan, then have to repay it within a tax year or otherwise pay tax on it as if it was regular income (disguised remuneration). This has actually been applied retrospectively and drove many people to bankruptcy. Why this cannot be applied to transfers between companies if they are related?

I’m not sure what you mean. Transfer pricing does happen within a tax year.

A gizmo is 95% assembled in Country A with 50% tax rate. Company wants to sell that 95% gizmo for 10% of the actual price to their subsidiary in Country B with a 5% tax rate. Finish the product there then book 90% of the revenue in the low tax country.

That’s transfer pricing. There are account regulations that define how that price is set. That said it’s hard with IP and other assets with less tangible value.

Post reply on HN