Never seen before OCDE pact for 15% minimum global corporate tax

[stompix]

I live in a country with very high taxes. On wages, that is. I also live in a tax paradise. For multinationals, of course.

So the Netherlands has very high taxes, Holland is a tax paradise but the Dutch are getting get the short end of the stick  

I would love to see government spend a bit less, but they're not going to do that. Taxing rich corporations would be good, because I don't like how "capital" is taking more and more wealth away for "labor". I've seen examples in which Starbucks pays a fraction of a percent in taxes, while competing with the small business owner next door who's tax rate is hundreds of times higher. That's just not right.

I would love to see all the governments stop hunting those corporations just for the sake of votes and understand one simple thing, it's far easier to tax the individual than a multinational company. Look in my own case, my parents-owned business is paying tax, ok, now after that the part of the profit that transferred into own accounts as dividends, again gets taxed!!!! And from that profit that has already been taxed twice, we pay more taxes and if we try to spend it we once more pay vat, taxes and taxes and taxes. So how about this, you stop taxing corporations and small businesses completely and you tax the ones that make money from those, directors, CEOs, shareholders, owners, everyone, just like you do with normal employees.

That money the corporations hide from taxes is going to end up in someone's account sooner or later, it's not like Starbucks is buying a yacht, Apple is driving a Bugatti, and Coca-Cola is spending millions on hookers and booze. Shut down the deductible expenses and other small holes that could hinder this and then it's pretty simple. Is Apple sitting on a mountain of cash, good for them! The moment they will try to send it to people in the company tax it as it's normal.

And such a tax model would be far better for small businesses too.

[buwaytress]

Nice post op and yes, the problem isn't and has never been the minimum. Even where there are tax breaks, those if done right are to incentivise new business to come up and to attract foreign investment.

The problem always has been and will continue to be aggressive tax optimisation -- skirting the law to legally avoid tax. Countries just have to make it as important to do a business, register it, and pay taxes in good faith. And hell, make them pay dearly for not doing so.

[Silberman]

I have a far better solution. Why not change the tax in all countries to that of Ireland?
Doesn't it make far more sense, companies would not have to go through all this, you won't have a lot of guys chasing them down and products would be much cheaper for everyone ? Of course, the governments would have to cut their spending and they will not have that much leverage when trying to bribe voters with claims that they are fighting the evil corporations and they are spending all their blood on these battles, but I could live with that.

Taxes, taxes and taxes...
All those governments have one single plan, tax the hell out of everything and try to hand as many freebies as they can to buy some votes, it doesn't matter than long term you're ruining your economy, it matters that you get the 51% necessary so you're set for 4 years.

A good solution there is just one problem for politicians in your plan, this makes a great deal of them obsolete and they will have to get a real job instead of being parasites that suck dry the money of those they are supposed to represent, and the people do not help themselves either when they see politicians trying to tax the rich they think of this as Robin Hood stealing from the rich to give the poor, not realizing that stealing is stealing regardless of who is the victim and that soon enough they will face the same fate.

[jostorres]

I would love to see all the governments stop hunting those corporations just for the sake of votes and understand one simple thing, it's far easier to tax the individual than a multinational company. Look in my own case, my parents-owned business is paying tax, ok, now after that the part of the profit that transferred into own accounts as dividends, again gets taxed!!!! And from that profit that has already been taxed twice, we pay more taxes and if we try to spend it we once more pay vat, taxes and taxes and taxes. So how about this, you stop taxing corporations and small businesses completely and you tax the ones that make money from those, directors, CEOs, shareholders, owners, everyone, just like you do with normal employees.

That money the corporations hide from taxes is going to end up in someone's account sooner or later, it's not like Starbucks is buying a yacht, Apple is driving a Bugatti, and Coca-Cola is spending millions on hookers and booze. Shut down the deductible expenses and other small holes that could hinder this and then it's pretty simple. Is Apple sitting on a mountain of cash, good for them! The moment they will try to send it to people in the company tax it as it's normal.

And such a tax model would be far better for small businesses too.

What we need is to put difference between business like your parents versus global business that makes 10+ billion dollars in profit. Do you realize how big 10+ billion dollars actually is? We are talking about nearly as much as some government make, and this is just one company, USA has a ton of those companies and other nations have a few of them as well.

It means instead of putting tax punishment on smaller business, how about punish all the big business? I know that will be hard because there are "poor" (as in not a billionaire) people who will defend amazon to not pay federal tax for some reason, no idea why people do that, they will never own amazon, so why do that? I have no idea but this is "standard company" all over again, we have too big monopolies. So drop the tax for shops like your parents, and increase any billionaire like a ton.

[jaysabi]

One of the things I see people Not notice all the time when talking about corporations and taxes.


And this is very important.   

Corporations.   Never. Ever. Pay taxes.

Seems like a BS statement right?   Work with me a second.

Who buys stuff?  you me the person next door.   who sells stuff? those evil corps!  So when a corp charges you money for items/services whos actually paying again?  why its the Consumer. 

Corps Always, and I mean that Always pass on what ever tax governments charge them to the consumer.  Some larger corps actually back charge the gov Administration time to collect that tax for that gov.

So when you start talking about How much a corporation Needs to Pay for what ever you think some sort of envy/justice due to them making money and you aren't compared....

Stop Stabbing yourself in the foot for the Love Of God.  Its ALWAYS YOU paying those taxes, ALWAYS, 100% of the time.  its Never those corporations.  Its always You and You and You to Governments that tend to waste it. Gov will Always tell the story that somehow that corp isnt paying its fair share.   It never pays ever anyways.  no matter what the story is.

Remember that!

Yes, corporations pay taxes. If you think that if taxes on corporations went away prices would suddenly drop for consumers, you're dreaming.  In fact, we saw this with the corporate tax cut from republicans 3-4 years ago.  Did prices drop?  No.  The executives gave themselves bonuses and bought back company stock, which further enriched the executives with stock options.  I'd rather corporations pay taxes and have an indirect cost passed on to consumers, which will be kept in check by competition, than eliminate corporate taxes and have the tax directly imposed on consumers by the government to make up for the lost revenue.

[Sithara007]

Ireland’s tax agreements with multi-national companies have been ruled by the court’s to violate EU laws in the past, so Ireland I think is an outlier. 130 countries signed on, there is clearly broad international support. Ireland even agreed in principle, they just think 15% minimum is too high, but their entire pitch to multi-nationals is as a tax haven. If they join a minimum tax pact, there’s no real reason to HQ in Ireland anymore.

LOL.. so around 130 out of approx. 200 countries signed up for this? It doesn't surprise me. Countries with high rates of corporate taxes will sign up, since it benefits them. On the other hand, tax havens (such as the Caribbean islands and gulf nations) would ignore this initiative, as it affects their revenues. In the end, the stalemate and status quo will persist. If Ireland agrees to this measure, then the companies will just relocate to some other tax haven, such as Luxembourg, Malta or San Marino. How much time it takes to shift HQ from one country to another?

[SquallLeonhart]

What we need is to put difference between business like your parents versus global business that makes 10+ billion dollars in profit. Do you realize how big 10+ billion dollars actually is? We are talking about nearly as much as some government make, and this is just one company, USA has a ton of those companies and other nations have a few of them as well.

It means instead of putting tax punishment on smaller business, how about punish all the big business? I know that will be hard because there are "poor" (as in not a billionaire) people who will defend amazon to not pay federal tax for some reason, no idea why people do that, they will never own amazon, so why do that? I have no idea but this is "standard company" all over again, we have too big monopolies. So drop the tax for shops like your parents, and increase any billionaire like a ton.

That was the thing that Biden offered for USA and yet they still faced a lot of backlash over the fact that big corporations would not pay the taxes and not only they will not pay taxes that they pay now (meaning there will be less tax collected when tax goes up?) but they will send their money overseas to better taxed places just to save them. So, the reason for Biden tax plan is rejected by republicans.... wait for it.... is how horrible corporations are!

Well, how about we start by not giving them 2 trillion dollars worth of tax break when a republican is president? Or how about we give HUGE punishments when they do? NOOOOOOOOOOO republicans would never be alright with giving big corporations punishment, then who will bribe them? This is why this 15% will be bare minimum and I am sure eventually USA will get to that 15% as well when Republicans take control of all three congress/senate/presidency one day and say that is the global agreement.

[stompix]

What we need is to put difference between business like your parents versus global business that makes 10+ billion dollars in profit. Do you realize how big 10+ billion dollars actually is? We are talking about nearly as much as some government make, and this is just one company, USA has a ton of those companies and other nations have a few of them as well.

No, we need to stop putting differences because when you try to regulate something giving somebody an advantage the ones with more resources will be able to get that one too, splitting their business, changing the main activity of the selected business, hiring youngsters in on branch and so on.

Get rid of taxation altogether and start trying to run a country not by taking 70% of what people make.

It means instead of putting tax punishment on smaller business, how about punish all the big business?

How about we stop punishing anybody? You don't realize maybe that in the end, all this punishing ends up in our pocket.

Big business and not some stand-alone entities, they have workers, they have suppliers, they have customers and more importantly, they have investors that have put their money in that company and now are taking that profit. Why should people who have invested in Apple be punished more than people who have invested in smaller companies? Does it make sense?
Get rid of those damn taxes for everyone, leave just the profit tax for individuals, if someone wants to take in 100 million profit, tax him, if a company doesn't want to pay a dime to investors let it invest all that money in whatever they see fit. At one point they will have to cash out, they will have to distribute those profits they make.

[jaysabi]

Ireland’s tax agreements with multi-national companies have been ruled by the court’s to violate EU laws in the past, so Ireland I think is an outlier. 130 countries signed on, there is clearly broad international support. Ireland even agreed in principle, they just think 15% minimum is too high, but their entire pitch to multi-nationals is as a tax haven. If they join a minimum tax pact, there’s no real reason to HQ in Ireland anymore.

LOL.. so around 130 out of approx. 200 countries signed up for this? It doesn't surprise me. Countries with high rates of corporate taxes will sign up, since it benefits them. On the other hand, tax havens (such as the Caribbean islands and gulf nations) would ignore this initiative, as it affects their revenues. In the end, the stalemate and status quo will persist. If Ireland agrees to this measure, then the companies will just relocate to some other tax haven, such as Luxembourg, Malta or San Marino. How much time it takes to shift HQ from one country to another?

Bermuda and the Cayman Islands are both signatories on the agreement, and Luxembourg's corporate tax rate is already higher than the proposed minimum in the agreement, so I reckon they would sign as well (though can't find definitively if they have already).  The 130 countries that have already signed represent 90% of global GDP, so yeah, my previous point stands unrefuted after your inaccurate post.

[stompix]

First, there was no pact, Ireland didn't agree to it, so the rest can get that 15% and stick it where it belongs.

What was I saying?

https://www.wsj.com/articles/ireland-could-derail-global-tax-reform-11625220355

While getting new tax legislation approved in Washington is no easy task, it also only takes one holdout in Brussels to block reform. European Union tax legislation requires unanimous approval, so Ireland has the power to stop any changes and has fellow holdouts Hungary and Estonia for company. Negotiations will be fierce and pressure high, but a stalemate is possible if Dublin sticks to its guns.

Welcome to the EU where a financial legislation reform needs unanimous votes so any country could lift the middle finger and from 130 countries having pact you're left with 100, and those 27 hosts one thrid of the largest corporations in the world. If the EU says No I don't see the others being stupid to shout yes either.

So, stick your taxes where they belong. I wonder what their backup plan on finding sources for free money to whoever votes for them? Maybe finally start working and stop spending other people's money? Really want to see this one happening!

[fillippone]

On every country having the same tax as Ireland, that is kind of what happened with the pact. Except that some countries won´t accept it, thus leaving room open.

First, there was no pact, Ireland didn't agree to it, so the rest can get that 15% and stick it where it belongs.
Second it not about every country having the same tax as Ireland but more on Ireland raising its tax to other countries levels.

I think the fact that one of the few countries not adhering to the global lower limit is  Ireland, is pretty much significative for the direction of the trade after being signed: vertical archiving in the dustbin

[magneto]

It's more for show than anything else.

As you said, most tax havens have tax rates of 15%+. And if they don't then they will probably readily oppose the proposal, in which case, what are the OECD countries going to do? The worst they can do is financial sanctions and I doubt that it would be very effective given that taxation revenue is what fuels these tax havens in the first place.

But you're right, it is a step in the right direction. I doubt it's enough, though.