
Tech Giants Face Hundreds of Millions in New Taxes in Europe - thisisit
https://www.wsj.com/articles/tech-giants-face-hundreds-of-millions-in-new-taxes-under-eu-proposals-1521633149
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dang
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16609116](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16609116)

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DoveBrown
I really don't understand why corporations are taxed on profit. It produces
weird effects such as where a company is better off paying interest on debt
rather than dividends on stock.

Having the tax be payable on revenue of a corporation in that jurisdiction
rather than profit would be simpler to understand, easier to administrate and
avoid the current tax avoidance we have have.

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wpasc
Example: My company makes 100M in revenue. To sell my goods, my cost is 99M, I
only have 1M in profit. If I were taxed on my 100M revenue, I would just lose
money and my business would have no point and I would have to close even
though I am profitable. If it costs me 99M to sell 100M worth of goods, why
wouldn't I be taxed on the 1M?

Why should two companies who have 100M in revenue at 99M costs vs 15M costs to
pay the same taxes?

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DoveBrown
A reason to not take on your profit is that your "cost of sales" can be a
pretty nebulous concept. How much of your 99M costs is licensing to entities
you control in other jurisdictions?

I understand why it is fairer have it be profit, but profit in the modern
accounting world seems to be a strange thing. A good accountant can make your
profit be anything you like, so it doesn't make sense to tax based on the idea
that company has bad accountants. Generally it is harder for accountants to
change revenue figures (other than defer into different years).

The rules lawyering as to what is a legitimate cost is huge.

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JustAnotherPat
Amazing how any Europeans bend over backwards for these companies and the USA.
What reason is there to oppose taxing what Faceboook generates off of European
users? Are they still under the delusion that Apple and co. isn't bringing all
those billions back stateside to enrich Wall Street? A continent with no
backbone!

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Eridrus
> companies whose annual global revenue exceeds €750 million ($918 million).
> The tax would apply to services where users play an important role in
> creating value, such as selling online ad space, social media or platform
> services for ride hailing or food delivery.

So it's basically a tax on EU punching bags, got it.

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lainga
Large multinational tech corporations with large presences in the EU, yet
which pay little to no taxes in the EU, also happen to be the EU's "punching
bags". Funny how policy and reality line up sometimes.

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andy_ppp
To be honest I’ve never bought into the idea of taxing companies where the
idea/IP was created, it seems weird and designed by lobbyists to make taking
tax revenue difficult.

These companies have played the game in terms of exploiting loopholes; I think
they deserve everything they get.

