How to Tax Cloud Computing? | Hacker News Reader

How to Tax Cloud Computing?

interconnected.blog

9 pointsceohockey6013 comments

I don't think this article motivates taxing Cloud Computing very well:

> The tech giants who built these hyper-clouds have massive advantages in building AI products and services that will continue to displace workers, who rely on low or predictable skills in both blue and white-collar industries.

Okay.... That seems like an emotional appeal, which on the face of it, is OK, but it doesn't stand up to any further thought. Should we consider whether a given product or innovation or improvement "displaces workers"? I mean, self-checkout and ATMs explicitly exist to displace workers. Arguing to not displace workers seems like an argument against changing anything.

The politico mini-interview linked to by this article has Cuban suggesting that robots that replace workers should contribute to Social Security, not taxing some amorphous concept like "cloud computing".

Further, given that Mark Cuban is a billionaire, one cannot just take his suggestion at face value. What does Cuban have going, what investments or trove of "intellectual property" does he have that are either negatively impacted by "cloud computing" or that would be positively impacted by robots paying into Social Security, or a per-server head tax?

Interesting article but he wants to tax the “profit of compute, network, etc…” but how you can legally define the profits generate from network data or computing power?

You can already tax the power consumption, or the company profits, but I see hard to find what he describes in the article. And also lots of super computer are made by states/research centers/universities and companies already pay to use the computing capability.

The real thing they're trying to tax is some part of the massive impact that AI and other automation will have on the economy and lives of people who will lose jobs. It's just going to be harder and harder to have a decent lifestyle in the US if you aren't fortunate to have great education in a important area that isn't automated.

If I had a factory that used to employ a thousand people to make widgets and it gets automated and now makes the same with only 50 people, probably the cost of production is lower, but 950 people lost their jobs. In my West Coast city we already have tons of people that can't find a job (some lost through automation?) where they can afford an apartment and so they live in their cars and later they live on the street. This is going to happen to increasing parts of the population in the US.

A great example of why it does not make sense to take random policy thoughts from billionaires particularly seriously.

This idea seems at best unworkable.

Just don’t tax it.

1) they’re already taxed

2) companies building on top pay tax

3) if you’re an end customer youre paying a tax

4) a billionaire is floating this idea. Sounds like redirection to me

For points 1-3 I suggest reading Colbert and, separately, reflecting on the history of excise taxes in the pre civil war era.

I suppose it would create a new market for clouds run by non-US entities.

Maybe, but if they run servers in the US, and you will need servers in the US, then you would still have to comply

There are already many non-US data centers to choose from

In Europe you pay VAT on servers

In the USA you pay sales or use tax on servers.

And on the electricity, the real-estate, the income, the employee payroll...

Unless you're a hyperscaler then you just don't. I wonder how mark thinks they won't just dodge this one as well

No mark we don't need digital realestate taxes we need the hyperscalers to pay their regular ass taxes they're supposed to be paying and enforce sustainability regulations.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com