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Comment by ndsipa_pomu | Hacker News Reader

I agree - it's a race to the bottom if different countries compete to provide global corporations the lowest tax bill.

which is why Janet Yellen was lobbying to tax global companies worldwide so they could not find tax shelters

Only American ones right? I can’t imagine Germany would be happy with America trying to tax SAP on its world wide income.

Said law is currently being passed in Germany so.

Ok, then SAP will have to pay taxes on worldwide income to both the USA and Germany, or will international companies be allowed to headquarter in a country with the best worldwide tax policy? Will Chinese companies have an advantage over Americans ones because they are just taxed in the jurisdiction they are doing business in vs. being taxed on world income by China?

You uave no idea how international taxation works. No, SAP, nor Apple, will pay taxes twice.

That’s right. But those companies that are subject to extra world taxes are determined by why their home country is, not via international treaty.

It only takes one hold-out.

That’s exactly how it should be. Without nation to nation competition, taxes would be even more outrageous than they already are. The institution that monopolizes violence in order to tax should be at the very least threatened by the risk of losing its constituents to other nations/regions that offer a better deal.

You missed the memonof a global minimum corporate tax, thatbia being implemented rihht now, didn't you?

It seems the majoroty of people, and governments, have not too much interest to exist in a world of unlimited capitalism only benefiting the largest corporations and richest of people.

Republicans in the US are not on bored. They are threatening retaliation if EU countries move forward with it.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/house-lawmakers-europe-global-c...

And what exactly can tje GOP do? Unless they win the White House, in which case I guess even NATO membership of the US woupd be on the table, right?

Just remind me, how well did tue last GOP trade war with China go?

Simply one election away, from any sovereign country on earth, from disappearing.

Unfortunately, the "bottom" part of "to the bottom" isn't a very fun place to be.

Global corporations aren't generally looking for the lowest tax rates to house their companies, they are looking for the ways to avoid paying taxes in a higher tax country by offsetting them in tax havens. They do this by splitting themselves into multiple shell companies, then play dodgy games of selling things to themselves at stupid prices: charge one subsidiary a few dollars for a missile and another $50k for a roll of toilet paper. This practice should be illegal as it's basically tax evasion and fraud. But, our politicians are corrupt cowards, so we all have to pretend it's just good housekeeping and lump it.

All the megacorps would be fantastically successful without playing these stupid games (most of them did their greatest growth spurts before they started doing it), and our countries would be so much nicer places to live if we only agreed that paying back to the society that nurtured you was an important part of the social contract.

Tax is civilisation. By pushing back against it like this you are essentially pushing back against civilisation, and the effects of this are all around us in our crumbling infrastructure, failing health, and desperate tent cities.

> . They do this by splitting themselves into multiple shell companies, then play dodgy games of selling things to themselves at stupid prices: charge one subsidiary a few dollars for a missile and another $50k for a roll of toilet paper.

I was under the impression that the vast majority of it was via collecting "royalties" for the branding? Ie: a company's trademarked brands are owned by a holding company HQ'd in a tax shelter, and the parent company pays a licensing fee that just so happens to equal most if not all of their profits for the year.

It seems like it'd be pretty trivial to target via a tax on payments for intellectual property royalties to offshore corporations or a law that deems it tax evasion to pay IP royalties to a holding company outside the US for a corporation that is primarily operating in the US and Canada.

Suppose one government at time x makes corrupt/stupid decisions costing taxpayers at time x+30 years by having to pay debts that serve no benefit. I don’t see why I should be responsible to pay that, and it has been a factor in deciding which US jurisdiction to live in.

> and our countries would be so much nicer places to live if we only agreed that paying back to the society that nurtured you was an important part of the social contract.

This is constantly in flux, and declining fertility rates kind of throw this calculation for a loop.

I upvoted you because you are right. I will never understand the excitement of the Hacker News community to pay a 50% penalty to the worst type of people on earth, those that do not produce.

Because I like roads and public infrastructure and a social safety net?

What, you wouldn't like a world where you can only drive on the roads you pay for, as part of your AppleWay™ subscription? Not to be confused with the roads available on GoogleMotor™, of course! But there would be some interoperability: every pedestrian crossing would support the Microsoft Nickel&Dime™ system, so you can pay to enable the crossing. No more would we be slaves of those irresponsible elected bureaucrats, but rather conscious consumers making informed choices between different companies!

You don't have a safety net. You have interest payments on the Iraq War, Gulf War, Afghanistan War, GFC bailouts, HN bank bailout (SVC), and mountains and mountains of past spending. It will be 100% of the budget in not too long.

It's the same excitement that I feel when I visit a relative in hospital and see they're taken care of without going bankrupt, when I take my kids to schools that my taxes paid for, on roads that my taxes paid for, in a country that isn't 10 meters under water because of the taxes that I paid in a place where poverty is reasonably rare (though not yet completely eradicated) and where because of that it is pretty safe to live and so on.

And what have those Romans ever done for us anyway?

When you manipulate the playing field to give you an advantage, it's not a competition. The idea that companies or whole nations "compete" by lowering wages/taxes, will destroy capitalism. We can already observe the bad effect: The company sector has become a net saver in most western countries, while tax-cut proponents claim, companies will invest more with lower taxes. It's a lie. The role of the company sector is to make debt and invest. If that's not the case anymore, someone else has to make the debt instead. Which is the government. How is that still capitalism?

What are you ranting about? Mega corps like Apple pay barely any taxes. Did you mix up middle class workers and global corporations?

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