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Comment by mentat | Hacker News Reader

What it owes is what the IRS can get, there's not some abstract "just" amount that it should pay.

Isn't this confusing the "free" market with the tax code?

Why is Facebook's tax liability some arcane figure that can only be determined by IRS clout, Facebook lobbying/marketing/lawyers and the revolving door between the private and public sector?

It depends on the value of an intangible asset. Who do you propose set the price?

I agree that there are difficulties in assessing the value of some of the assets (like the article mentions).

I just don't believe "what they can get" should be one of our options.

Ideally, there would be an impartial entity responsible for settling these valuation disputes (how do we handle this between corporations?). Heck, I'd even take using market valuations (which isn't the same thing as whatever the IRS can get from FB).

Transactions between corporations are generally voluntary. They agree on a price, or there's no exchange. The impartial entity in this case is the court system.

All transactions are voluntary but they are also verified by 3rd parties to prevent tax avoidance and other shenanigans. For example if I want to leave a property to some one if I gift it to them they (or I) will have to pay tax on it just like on any other transaction the value of the property would be assessed and it will be taxed. This happens regardless of the sum of the transaction so I can't just sell it to them for 1$ so effectively no tax would be paid, in these kinds of transactions they usually tax the value of the transaction unless it was substantially lower than the estimate (most government estimates are some what low balled).

If I report a transaction for a value considerably lower than the estimate they'll investigate it which usually would result in a new estimation and if that one is as well differs considerably than the transaction amount there would be an investigation regarding possible tax evasion.

Corporations aren't different when they exchange assets the valuation figures are reported to the authorities if the regulatory body thinks the estimates were set higher or lower than their actual value they can choose to open an investigation and if need be fine or prosecute the offending parties.

Not commenting on this specific case, but there is such an amount. There's a difference between what's actually just and what can be proven in court.

No two people are going to agree on what that "just" amount is, and there's no way to otherwise empirically determine it.

In other words, it doesn't exist.

Just because you cannot precisely identify the location of an electron, that does not imply that it does not exist.

In fact, an electron does not have a precise location. We can, however, detect electrons' presence based on their observed effects.

There are no equivalent "observed effects" of some hypothetical "just" amount that Facebook should owe to the IRS.

Tax law is so complicated and vague that there isn't even an objective measure of what an individual owes, let alone a corporation. There's a lot of discretion in the deductions. I believe over the past ~10 years the IRS has really been cracking down on home office deductions, for instance, and it was all interpretation of existing laws, not new ones. And that's just one example.

So let me guess, you think OJ didn't do it?

What an absurd ontology, truth by legal procedure. There's a difference between the process we use to ascertain facts for purposes of administering force, and what the actual truth is.

In the scenario of "What a company owes to the IRS", the outcome of legal procedure is the absolute source of truth. There's no definition of that amount outside of any legal context.

OJ killing his wife is an event that occurred independently of the existence of our legal system. A company owing taxes to the IRS is a matter that literally only exists within the context of the United States legal code.

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