Tax. Getting screwed by corporations. Again

Discussion in 'Lounge' started by gliddofglood, Nov 1, 2012.

  1. Newsnight making my blood boil again.

    It transpires that as the common taxpayer has to put up with swingeing cuts to balance the budget, corporations are paying a derisory 2% or 4% corporation tax. Of course, if you have a little business (having its work cut out to compete with the big boys anyway) and actually make a profit, you can hand 22% of that to the government.

    All the minister is prepared to tell us is that they are investing more money in tax inspectors. But then there is hand wringing about not being able to do anything. WTF? They are elected to enact legislation. It's their watch, their responsibility to make sure that the likes of Starbucks and Google cough up.

    The whole idea of inventing charges for "use of brands or trademarks" so that you can repatriate massive profits to low tax jurisdictions is farcical. When is someone going to get tough on big business?

    Here is Switzerland in the last 48 hours, UBS is getting rid of 10'000 bankers worldwide (quite in favour of that one...), Lonza the big pharmaceutical company will downsize 400 people here (think they are still pretty profitable) and Swisscom will do without the services of another 400 people. Everywhere it's the same old story. Get rid of people and pay as little tax as possible so that profits can climb indefinitely. Well fine (sort of) if the country is awash with cash, but right now it isn't. When are governments going to get real with these people? When is the electorate going to get seriously pissed off with buying lattes so that Starbucks can contribute precisely nothing on all the profit they make out of them?
     
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  2. As a victim of the tax system, I agree with much of the above.

    i find more and more that the extra inspectors just chase the easy targets, e.g. Me and the other millions who already pay more than we use, with new ways to proverbially "dry hump" us, as it is too difficult to actually work effing hard and get those who are bleeding the system (either at the very top, or very bottom of the system).
     
  3. the thing is, the powerful (usually above/behind the government depending on how you look at it) will maintain the status quo, meaning that the powerful will always be able to legitimately avoid paying tax...
     
  4. If it was you or I who'd not paid a tenner there would be threats and all sorts.
    Quite frankly if they don't pay tax they shouldn't be trading on our soil! Everything's being cut. Disabled people being told fit for work and having benefits taken away .
    In reality who is going to employ a lot of them with changes and H&s issues they'd have to implement?
    Talk of 2 tier road tax ( like to see that tried!) when basically if these big companies like Starbucks and was it Tescos?
    Paid up into the coffers it would sort out a lot more revenue then taking from easy targets!
    It's totally wrong.
     
  5. What I can't get over is that there are futile debates over a mansion tax, or non-doms tax which would bring in a few million, and getting hold of individuals who are hiding revenues abroad, but nothing is being done or barely talked about concerning the billions of £ which could be levied in tax in the UK on companies who have made their money there.

    It's not they'd get up and leave if they had to pay the full 22% corporation tax. It's a no-lose game. These companies make way too much money in the UK for them to turn their back on the market.

    What are the Spanish and the Greeks going to say about this, as they are led into poverty? At the end of the day, it's pretty much the whole of Europe that is concerned.

    UK's debt is increasing, so that the multinationals can give more money to shareholders (who mostly won't be UK citizens in any case, on the law of averages).

    Maybe people should be writing to MPs.
     
  6. Your lucky if you lived in Greece and made statements like that they would have you up in front of the local beak
     
  7. Doubt they'd have the manpower to come and get me. They've probably made most of their police redundant, like everyone else.
     
  8. It is far too easy for the govt to shaft people on PAYE who are a captive market and who can not rearrange their affairs to minimise or avoid tax

    Maybe the govt sees this as an incentive for people to become self employed and start up their own business

    however that aside the govt knows what the tax loop holes are and does nothing to plug them and if they jailed a few facilitators / advisors who set up these schemes for companies to exploit and jailed a few executives of the large companies who evade tax then it would become a personal issue for large companies who would then either relocate or pay their share
     
  9. When the corporations are big multinationals while the governments control tax collection only within each little nation, the corporations can always transfer-price income, assets or profits from one country to another to minimise tax liabilities. And if they can, they will. The solution is tax harmonisation across bigger areas, such as the whole EU. Without harmonisation the problem can only get worse.
     
  10. Article on companies who evade corporation tax:

    A roll call of corporate rogues who are milking the country | Seumas Milne | Comment is free | The Guardian

    Government ministers see fit to vilify selected individuals (mostly those who do not donate funds to the party of the government) regarding their tax affairs, yet they are actively slashing the UK tax inspection force. Jimmy Carr was rightly criticised for his tax arrangements, but not a single word about Gary Barlow, Sor Philip Green & other chums of the government.

    Companies who register overseas offices to evade UK tax include: Alliance Boots (formerly Boots the Chemist), Amazon, Vodafone, Apple, Starbucks, Glaxo SmithKlein.
    It would be nice to hit these companies in their pockets by boycotting them, but I don't see enough people taking such action simply because so few people are aware of the situation.

    I have written to my MP on the subject, but as with letters on other topics she doesn't even acknowledge the communication. She just votes with the government line regardless of the opinions of her ordinary constituents. Ho hum....
     
  11. I worked for a company that used large quantities of simple metal pins that were bought from the parent company in the States for $1+ each. We started getting them locally for 10p each and were told in no uncertain terms that wasn't acceptable and that we had to continue using the expensive imported pin.
     
  12. Federal Europe is not the answer, look at the PIGS economies, the euro about to fail and yet Germany & France are still pushing forward with Federal Europe

    Tax harmonisation would needs to go a lot further afield than just the EU, it needs to be extended to all countries we trade with, this is just not practical

    Far more simple is to impose import tarriffs on goods imported from any country with a tax basis lower than our own to retrun everything to a level playing field
     
  13. If UK imposed import tariffs on lots of goods from lots of countries, those countries would soon impose retaliatory tariffs on UK exports. Trade would be reduced overall, everybody would be poorer, and the UK as one of the world's major trading nations would lose more than most from the reduction. Besides transfer pricing applies to services as well as goods, and it is impractical to impose tariffs on those. A good part of the world's hugely increased prosperity over the past 60 years is the result of the mutual reduction and elimination of tariffs; reversing that now would be short-sighted in the extreme.
     
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  14. I'd just impose a tax system based on profits effected in Britain and say that under British company law the re-billing or trademark usage for companies in the same group is illegal.

    And then I'd close all the other loopholes.

    I don't blame the companies per se: they are bound to operate within the law to reduce their tax liability. It's up to the government to ensure that it gets the tax it needs. The current system is neither equitable for smaller companies, or makes any economic sense for the government.
     
  15. far from being short sighted leaving things as they are countries with higher taxation and higher social costs are at a huge competitive disadvantage and ultimately putting import tariffs on is part of the cost of having a welfare state

    cheap imports are in reality very expensive as they are effectively exporting of jobs and commerical opportunities overseas and what we are really importing for these lost opportunities is unemployment

    the option of not protecting the welfare state is to get rid of it and have a free market with no social welfare costs

    some may think that this is a better option
     
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  16. So you think accepting a huge competitive disadvantage is a good thing ?

    And doing something ourselves expensively is better than getting someone else to do it cheaply ?

    And the welfare state can only be all or nothing ?

    Wow :eek:
     
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  17. I absolutely agree with you Pete but there are some major questions to be answered over how that prosperity should be distributed. Those at the top are taking an ever larger slice of an ever bigger cake, and that will lead to tears.
     
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  18. They can and they do. Everything that comes in to the UK or goes out, for that matter, is covered by a commodity code. And depending what that is will determine the level of tax to be paid by the importer. For example a product we export to the US carries an import duty of 5.3%. However in Canada it is 11.9%.

    There are of course. agreements such as between EU countries where the import codes would not apply.
     
  19. In the long term we can only have the sort of welfare state we can afford, and what we can afford depends on our productivity and wealth creation.

    You seem to be postulating that our current level of welfare support is more than we can afford. Even if that be so (and I am not agreeing), we will not be able to afford it any better by imposing tariff barriers and strangling trade.

    UK will never gain prosperity by undercutting low-cost developing countries, nor by import-substitution and excluding their cheap products. Our way forward is to develop things we do better, and to keep ahead of the game.
     
  20. True. Most of the remaining tariffs are a great deal lower than they used to be, and there are international processes in place for negotiating them to still lower levels. Those processes could be reversed, one supposes, but who would benefit?

    Small island nations e.g in the Caribbean run the risk of spending all their money on importing desirable goods, leaving them broke; it is understandable they may have to impose steep import duties just to keep solvent. No major industrial nation should have to resort to such an expedient.
     
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