A superb Speech and Vow by Cameron well above expectations
Discussion
Rovinghawk said:
CamMoreRon said:
What you are saying is: If you write a law to make it legal not to pay tax, then the economy hasn't lost anything because it is no longer entitled to it. Do you see how ludicrous that idea is?
We are not making laws legalising non-payment of tax. We are making laws explaining what tax must be paid. If you have a car with a VED less than £450, you have arranged your personal affairs so as to lessen your tax bill. Is this ludicrous because you 'should' pay the full £450?
CamMoreRon said:
Tax that would otherwise be paid in a fair system
I'm not sure what 'fair' means. Would you please tell me what you mean by 'fair'?CamMoreRon said:
I can make this clearer for you if you need me to. Please say.
Please do. I'd like it if you could start by explaining why tax should be paid when it's not actually due.sidicks said:
By the way, Labour and the Toris are different, you knew that, right?
Ah yes, red tie = Labour, blue tie = Conservative.various said:
But tax avoidance is legal.
Yes, well done, I know this. I am saying that is the problem! The law has been designed to create these loopholes and allow those who can afford it to reduce their tax obligations to near-zero levels.People comparing this to ISA's - I hope you can see the absurdity of that argument.
My brother, for example, runs a successful printing business. His profits are in the region of £100k annually, and he is obligated by the law to hand over ~20% of that to the government. He employs 6 people and pays them a living wage.
Amazon, on the other hand, made a UK turnover of £6.5 BILLION in 2012, and paid £3.2 MILLION. They have, because they can afford to have, complex systems that reduce their tax burden by exploiting the laws we have and making use of tax havens.
Is this fair?
My brother, who pays a living wage to permanent employees, pays his full tax responsibility; whereas Amazon, who pay minimum wage to contract workers, pay a pitiful percentage of theirs. Why? Because they are rich enough to exploit the system and hide their trails.
Now, before I get quotes from people claiming that this is legal so therefore no wrong has been comitted.. I KNOW IT IS LEGAL. That is the problem. You are misunderstanding the point. The laws need to change to make this ILLEGAL.
Why?
Because the NHS is "unsustainable", benefits are "unsustainable" state ownership of transport, energy, POST (cough Royal Mail) were "unsustainable" - and this ideology is FALSE.
These things are only "unsustainable" because we have a tax system that lets the really big earners, who should really contribute the most, off their obligation to the state. The little people - US - are expected to prop everything up.
sidicks said:
This isn't the Open Univeristy!!
You're the one making the absurd claims about things you obviously have no basic understanding about. How about you bother to do some research about Starbucs, Amazon, Vodafone etc and then come back when you're ready for a discussion? That way your claims may be somewhat more grounded in reality...
TRANSLATION:You're the one making the absurd claims about things you obviously have no basic understanding about. How about you bother to do some research about Starbucs, Amazon, Vodafone etc and then come back when you're ready for a discussion? That way your claims may be somewhat more grounded in reality...
I can't, because I don't know the answer. I just know what I believe.
How about you prove you know what you're talking about. I'm trying to explain a situation and provide some information, all you are doing is denying.
CamMoreRon said:
Yes, well done, I know this. I am saying that is the problem! The law has been designed to create these loopholes and allow those who can afford it to reduce their tax obligations to near-zero levels.
People comparing this to ISA's - I hope you can see the absurdity of that argument.
My brother, for example, runs a successful printing business. His profits are in the region of £100k annually, and he is obligated by the law to hand over ~20% of that to the government. He employs 6 people and pays them a living wage.
Amazon, on the other hand, made a UK turnover of £6.5 BILLION in 2012, and paid £3.2 MILLION. They have, because they can afford to have, complex systems that reduce their tax burden by exploiting the laws we have and making use of tax havens.
Is this fair?
My brother, who pays a living wage to permanent employees, pays his full tax responsibility; whereas Amazon, who pay minimum wage to contract workers, pay a pitiful percentage of theirs. Why? Because they are rich enough to exploit the system and hide their trails.
Now, before I get quotes from people claiming that this is legal so therefore no wrong has been comitted.. I KNOW IT IS LEGAL. That is the problem. You are misunderstanding the point. The laws need to change to make this ILLEGAL.
Why?
Because the NHS is "unsustainable", benefits are "unsustainable" state ownership of transport, energy, POST (cough Royal Mail) were "unsustainable" - and this ideology is FALSE.
These things are only "unsustainable" because we have a tax system that lets the really big earners, who should really contribute the most, off their obligation to the state. The little people - US - are expected to prop everything up.
You're clearly very bright, so why are you comparing tax paid against turnover v tax paid against profit? You'd stand a lot more chance of convincing a skeptic like me if your comparisons were valid. It can't be hard to find out what Amazon's UK profit actually was. People comparing this to ISA's - I hope you can see the absurdity of that argument.
My brother, for example, runs a successful printing business. His profits are in the region of £100k annually, and he is obligated by the law to hand over ~20% of that to the government. He employs 6 people and pays them a living wage.
Amazon, on the other hand, made a UK turnover of £6.5 BILLION in 2012, and paid £3.2 MILLION. They have, because they can afford to have, complex systems that reduce their tax burden by exploiting the laws we have and making use of tax havens.
Is this fair?
My brother, who pays a living wage to permanent employees, pays his full tax responsibility; whereas Amazon, who pay minimum wage to contract workers, pay a pitiful percentage of theirs. Why? Because they are rich enough to exploit the system and hide their trails.
Now, before I get quotes from people claiming that this is legal so therefore no wrong has been comitted.. I KNOW IT IS LEGAL. That is the problem. You are misunderstanding the point. The laws need to change to make this ILLEGAL.
Why?
Because the NHS is "unsustainable", benefits are "unsustainable" state ownership of transport, energy, POST (cough Royal Mail) were "unsustainable" - and this ideology is FALSE.
These things are only "unsustainable" because we have a tax system that lets the really big earners, who should really contribute the most, off their obligation to the state. The little people - US - are expected to prop everything up.
CamMoreRon said:
Amazon, on the other hand, made a UK turnover of £6.5 BILLION in 2012, and paid £3.2 MILLION. They have, because they can afford to have, complex systems that reduce their tax burden by exploiting the laws we have and making use of tax havens.
Herein lies the flaw. Amazon is not exploiting the laws we make. They are exploiting OECD Tax Treaty rules agreed by the G20, rules that are right now being reviewed to try to reduce the incidence of "Beggar thy neighbour" tax policies by countries such as Brazil, China, India, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Ireland and of course the UK.Edited by NormalWisdom on Thursday 2nd October 13:02
CamMoreRon said:
My brother, for example, runs a successful printing business. His profits are in the region of £100k annually, and he is obligated by the law to hand over ~20% of that to the government. He employs 6 people and pays them a living wage.
Amazon, on the other hand, made a UK turnover of £6.5 BILLION in 2012, and paid £3.2 MILLION. They have, because they can afford to have, complex systems that reduce their tax burden by exploiting the laws we have and making use of tax havens.
My bold. Apples v Oranges?Amazon, on the other hand, made a UK turnover of £6.5 BILLION in 2012, and paid £3.2 MILLION. They have, because they can afford to have, complex systems that reduce their tax burden by exploiting the laws we have and making use of tax havens.
CamMoreRon said:
TRANSLATION:
I can't, because I don't know the answer. I just know what I believe.
How about you prove you know what you're talking about. I'm trying to explain a situation and provide some information, all you are doing is denying.
As with the majority off your posts you are totally wrong - it's fairly simple (with a bit of effort) to get a basic understanding of the vastly different issues for the 3 companies mentioned. But I don't need to prove myself.I can't, because I don't know the answer. I just know what I believe.
How about you prove you know what you're talking about. I'm trying to explain a situation and provide some information, all you are doing is denying.
Your username, your recent posts and the fact that you deem it appropriate to lump Starbucks, Vodafone and Amazon in the tax avoiding bucket without explanation confirms all that needs to be said about your knowledge in this area.
While you feel compelled to make rants about issues you clearly do not understand is interesting!
Keep going though, it's highly amusing!
CamMoreRon said:
People comparing this to ISA's - I hope you can see the absurdity of that argument.
I can't- would you please explain it to me?CamMoreRon said:
Is this fair?
If you understand that the same rules apply to both organisations, it could very easily be called fair.CamMoreRon said:
My brother....... pays his full tax responsibility; whereas Amazon............. pay a pitiful percentage of theirs.
AIUI amazon pay their full tax responsibility- it's just that their responsibility is quite low.CamMoreRon said:
Because they are rich enough to exploit the system and hide their trails.
They don't hide their trail- the whole point of what they do is that it's in plain sight. Don't let facts get in the way, though.CamMoreRon said:
I KNOW IT IS LEGAL. That is the problem. You are misunderstanding the point. The laws need to change to make this ILLEGAL.
Tell me how you would do this without adverse consequences for normal businesses, or have you not thought it through that far?I have a business. I set my expenses against tax. Your brother does the same, presumably. Why can big companies not set their expenses against tax? If you want different rules for them compared to eg your brother, is this 'fair'?
ClaphamGT3 said:
With regard to your post about non essential services, you will note that the current Govt has pledged to continue its commitment to protect the NHS budget and to invest in infrastructure where a return on that investment can be shown.
Beyond this spending however, there is still very significant non-essential public sector spend and, to compound that, inefficiency and wastage even in essential spend. this is on a massive scale. One small example is in the NHS. The NHS owns - and pays to maintain - a redundant estate slightly larger than the entire footprint of the Sainsbury's retail, office and distribution portfolio in the UK. This is property that is not used by the NHS and never will be again. Another example would be the ludicrous inefficiency that exists in provision of step-down care and the division of responsibilities between the NHS and the ASC function of the local authority. Unquestionably an essential service but managed hideously inefficiently with ASC budget consumed by paying bed-blocking new to acute trusts, paying for emergency provision in private care homes and paying for agency home carers because there is no integrated system of demand planning between the NHS and local authorities.
I could go on and, in my working life as head of our public sector practice, I see these sort of things day-in-day-out but to say that there is no room for massive savings in public sector expenditure in the UK is astonishingly ignorant.
Good post - so why aren't governments acting? What can you or I do to change this?Beyond this spending however, there is still very significant non-essential public sector spend and, to compound that, inefficiency and wastage even in essential spend. this is on a massive scale. One small example is in the NHS. The NHS owns - and pays to maintain - a redundant estate slightly larger than the entire footprint of the Sainsbury's retail, office and distribution portfolio in the UK. This is property that is not used by the NHS and never will be again. Another example would be the ludicrous inefficiency that exists in provision of step-down care and the division of responsibilities between the NHS and the ASC function of the local authority. Unquestionably an essential service but managed hideously inefficiently with ASC budget consumed by paying bed-blocking new to acute trusts, paying for emergency provision in private care homes and paying for agency home carers because there is no integrated system of demand planning between the NHS and local authorities.
I could go on and, in my working life as head of our public sector practice, I see these sort of things day-in-day-out but to say that there is no room for massive savings in public sector expenditure in the UK is astonishingly ignorant.
https://www.gov.uk/government/policies/making-sure... suggests they are trying
Maybe the pace of change is just glacial? I see houses going up now on a large hospital site in my city that has been pretty much vacant for the last 15 years.
Maybe the priorities are wrong?
Maybe we've spent the last 4 years wasting time on a massive and costly re-organisation that ignores these issues?
edh said:
Good post - so why aren't governments acting? What can you or I do to change this?
https://www.gov.uk/government/policies/making-sure... suggests they are trying
Maybe the pace of change is just glacial? I see houses going up now on a large hospital site in my city that has been pretty much vacant for the last 15 years.
Maybe the priorities are wrong?
Maybe we've spent the last 4 years wasting time on a massive and costly re-organisation that ignores these issues?
Maybe we had a 10-year period of unprecedented with record tax recipes which could have been invested wisely....https://www.gov.uk/government/policies/making-sure... suggests they are trying
Maybe the pace of change is just glacial? I see houses going up now on a large hospital site in my city that has been pretty much vacant for the last 15 years.
Maybe the priorities are wrong?
Maybe we've spent the last 4 years wasting time on a massive and costly re-organisation that ignores these issues?
Rovinghawk said:
CamMoreRon said:
People comparing this to ISA's - I hope you can see the absurdity of that argument.
I can't- would you please explain it to me?Secondly, this money stays in the UK economy: it resides in a UK bank, and is saved for purchases (generally) made in the UK. This money does not disappear.
Thirdly, this applies to all: anyone can set up an ISA and it costs £1 to open one up; it costs substantially more than that so set up an overseas subsidiary to create illusory debts to yourself.
Rovinghawk said:
CamMoreRon said:
Is this fair?
If you understand that the same rules apply to both organisations, it could very easily be called fair.Rovinghawk said:
AIUI amazon pay their full tax responsibility- it's just that their responsibility is quite low.
They don't hide their trail- the whole point of what they do is that it's in plain sight. Don't let facts get in the way, though.
Again, this is because the law has been structured to benefit big companies, not little people.They don't hide their trail- the whole point of what they do is that it's in plain sight. Don't let facts get in the way, though.
Rovinghawk said:
I have a business. I set my expenses against tax. Your brother does the same, presumably. Why can big companies not set their expenses against tax? If you want different rules for them compared to eg your brother, is this 'fair'?
Yes, and I will do the same with VAT when I have mine up and running. This is perfectly legitimate because otherwise you are paying tax twice. How this differs is that you or I would not be fabricating debts to ourselves to reduce the tax burden.sidicks said:
As with the majority off your posts you are totally wrong - it's fairly simple (with a bit of effort) to get a basic understanding of the vastly different issues for the 3 companies mentioned. But I don't need to prove myself.
Again, all you have done is deny what I have said. You're using an age-old tactic of diverting attention by trying to insult my character rather than respond to my points. CamMoreRon said:
Rovinghawk said:
CamMoreRon said:
People comparing this to ISA's - I hope you can see the absurdity of that argument.
I can't- would you please explain it to me?Secondly, this money stays in the UK economy: it resides in a UK bank, and is saved for purchases (generally) made in the UK. This money does not disappear.
Thirdly, this applies to all: anyone can set up an ISA and it costs £1 to open one up; it costs substantially more than that so set up an overseas subsidiary to create illusory debts to yourself.
Rovinghawk said:
CamMoreRon said:
Is this fair?
If you understand that the same rules apply to both organisations, it could very easily be called fair.Rovinghawk said:
AIUI amazon pay their full tax responsibility- it's just that their responsibility is quite low.
They don't hide their trail- the whole point of what they do is that it's in plain sight. Don't let facts get in the way, though.
Again, this is because the law has been structured to benefit big companies, not little people.They don't hide their trail- the whole point of what they do is that it's in plain sight. Don't let facts get in the way, though.
Rovinghawk said:
I have a business. I set my expenses against tax. Your brother does the same, presumably. Why can big companies not set their expenses against tax? If you want different rules for them compared to eg your brother, is this 'fair'?
Yes, and I will do the same with VAT when I have mine up and running. This is perfectly legitimate because otherwise you are paying tax twice. How this differs is that you or I would not be fabricating debts to ourselves to reduce the tax burden.They would be very interested Im sure.
To turn this round for our crusader for fairness, your brother, as a small businessman, will be/should be accessing all kinds of reliefs/allowances/grants/concessions. I part-own a very much bigger business but I think that this is "fair" and, more importantly, sensible.
But what happens when we nail those greedy corporates who fill their boots by avoiding taxes? Well, they might go elsewhere, which means that they won't be commissioning any print from the local printers, which is bad news for small businesses like your brother. It also means that, as they won't be paying any UK tax or employing any UK people or using any UK suppliers, there might not be the money to fund small business business rate relief/small business lower rate of CT/entrepreneurs relief on CGT/funding for apprentices etc. which would all affect your brother's business.
Secondly, on a more moral note, it might be argued (though only by a simpleton) that, if it's all about fairness, it isn't "fair" that your brothers business gets the government subsidies that it does. That might of course make your brothers business untenable, it might mean that he has to let some of his people go, who will have to go into lower paid jobs, it may mean that he has to move to a smaller house, it may mean that he can't afford to fund your folks residential care when they get older, it may mean that he can't afford to send his kids to university so they end up spending their lives flipping burgers on a minimum wage zero-hours contract but don't you dare complain because, above all else, that would be FAIR.
But what happens when we nail those greedy corporates who fill their boots by avoiding taxes? Well, they might go elsewhere, which means that they won't be commissioning any print from the local printers, which is bad news for small businesses like your brother. It also means that, as they won't be paying any UK tax or employing any UK people or using any UK suppliers, there might not be the money to fund small business business rate relief/small business lower rate of CT/entrepreneurs relief on CGT/funding for apprentices etc. which would all affect your brother's business.
Secondly, on a more moral note, it might be argued (though only by a simpleton) that, if it's all about fairness, it isn't "fair" that your brothers business gets the government subsidies that it does. That might of course make your brothers business untenable, it might mean that he has to let some of his people go, who will have to go into lower paid jobs, it may mean that he has to move to a smaller house, it may mean that he can't afford to fund your folks residential care when they get older, it may mean that he can't afford to send his kids to university so they end up spending their lives flipping burgers on a minimum wage zero-hours contract but don't you dare complain because, above all else, that would be FAIR.
CamMoreRon said:
Yes, and I will do the same with VAT when I have mine up and running. This is perfectly legitimate because otherwise you are paying tax twice. How this differs is that you or I would not be fabricating debts to ourselves to reduce the tax burden.
I think I should explain this further..Amazon, for example, are not just offsetting VAT to reduce their obligations. They are creating debts on their balance sheet to reduce the profit they declare. This is a very, very important distinction to make.
CamMoreRon said:
Firstly, a question of scale: nobody is putting £1Bn tax-free in to their ISA.
How much does the tax benefit cost on average for the whole population?CamMoreRon said:
Secondly, this money stays in the UK economy
Only partly true.CamMoreRon said:
: it resides in a UK bank,
Not true at all.CamMoreRon said:
and is saved for purchases (generally) made in the UK. This money does not disappear.
To some extent true.CamMoreRon said:
Thirdly, this applies to all: anyone can set up an ISA and it costs £1 to open one up; it costs substantially more than that so set up an overseas subsidiary to create illusory debts to yourself.
Cash ISAs are free to open.CamMoreRon said:
Yes, and I will do the same with VAT when I have mine up and running. This is perfectly legitimate because otherwise you are paying tax twice. How this differs is that you or I would not be fabricating debts to ourselves to reduce the tax burden.
Who is fabricating debts to reduce their tax bill? That would be tax evasion, make sure you give the authorities the benefit of your knowledge on this issue...Edited by sidicks on Thursday 2nd October 13:35
Edited by sidicks on Thursday 2nd October 13:38
CamMoreRon said:
Again, all you have done is deny what I have said. You're using an age-old tactic of diverting attention by trying to insult my character rather than respond to my points.
Your comparison of Amazon vs Your Brother using Profit vs Turnover was wrong - Suggest you learn basic accounting.If this country did not have these tax rules, the likes of Amazon, Vodafone, Starbucks and a lot of other foreign mulitnationals would leave the UK. Unemployment would spiral out of control, Income tax receipts would plummet and the country's economy would be in tatters. But that's fine for you I guess........
Gassing Station | News, Politics & Economics | Top of Page | What's New | My Stuff