tom_boy wrote:masukuma wrote:tom_boy wrote:tom_boy wrote:https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.ft.com/content/e38b60ce-27d7-11e8-b27e-cc62a39d57a0#ampshare=https://www.ft.com/content/e38b60ce-27d7-11e8-b27e-cc62a39d57a0
According to draft proposals seen by the Financial Times, the European Commission will unveil a three-pronged digital tax next week that targets revenues rather than profits, heeding calls in France, Germany and Britain for a tougher approach to tax avoidance by tech companies.
The levy, which is likely to be set at a rate of 3 per cent, will be raised against advertising revenues generated by digital companies such as Google, the fees raised from users and subscribers to services such as Apple or Spotify, and
the income made from selling personal data to third parties. This is a totally different matter but to be certain let me ask - who is selling personal data?
Read the article, it is very clear. Goverments are realising that social media companies need to pay tax directly to various jurisdictions where they operate. Its not about having a local office. Read carefully.
Read it a couple of times and a number of things standout
1) Governments are not satisfied with the current international laws on taxation because GAFA (Google Apple Facebook Amazon) figured out a way to beat the system especially by keeping most of their commercial operations in countries like Luxembourg and Ireland yet keep operating in their countries. So they pay the bare minimum.
2) they are proposing this "temporary" fix to try and raise those taxes back to what is 23% or so. This is a revenue based tax based on where digital users are. Even they know it's a bad idea that's why they are referring to it as a stop gap measure.
3) not all countries are in agreement.
Remember when I told you it's all about WHAT GOVERNMENT CAN GET AWAY WITH or WHAT GOVERNMENT CANNOT GET AWAY WITH? GAFA have operations in the EU and it's therefore asking those local operations to submit returns on such data is practical and possible and if they don't comply - you can funga mtu. These countries are consequential to these big companies and they can afford to be irrational without putting their necks on the line. Assume Facebook went rogue and refused to follow the dictates of the EU parliament - their local heads would be in trouble... the EU wouldn't 'block' facebook - that would be madness. Now compare that with your situation - you make an irrational call like that - who is to report to you? the only action you have on your plate is to ban/block GAFA and then you will face your masses way before Facebook faces you.
All Mushrooms are edible! Some Mushroom are only edible ONCE!