4 ms·

I wonder what would happen if G/F just upped and "left" the EU? Ensuring to close every physical location as they did so. I wonder how much of a bind the politi

by whb07 9y ago

I wonder what would happen if G/F just upped and "left" the EU? Ensuring to close every physical location as they did so. I wonder how much of a bind the politicians would be trying to remain in power as they would be in the position of trying to add Google and Facebook to the ban list or just continuing like normal except with less tax revenue. Does anyone here really believe that any EU bureaucrat would ban Facebook and Google? Enforce a massive ban like China or some dictatorship? I think it's one thing to never have had. It's another to have had and then have it taken away. The latter is infinitely more painful.

Thiez 9y ago
Do you honestly think that without US companies, there will be no search engines and social networks? Here in the Netherlands we had Hyves[1] before we had Facebook, which was pretty big. If, for whatever reason, Facebook were to vanish tomorrow from the EU tomorrow, I have little doubt that we'd all be on a different social network by Christmas. Of course there would be a lot of complaining during the first two weeks. I would miss Google more than I would Facebook, but perhaps an influx of 500 million new users would give competing search engines the income to improve their results to equal those of Google (perhaps they're already of comparable quality and I just haven't noticed). Google and Facebook are making a lot of money in the EU, and leaving the EU because they have to pay more taxes would be like cutting off the nose to spite the face. It just wouldn't make financial sense, and shareholders would (understandably) be furious. [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyves https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyves
- whb07 9y ago
  I didn't say they would truly close their doors to EU business. Very much the same way they operate in most of the world, that they should apply that to the EU. Google/Facebook don't have offices in over 100+ countries and yet they clearly serve those consumers from those countries just fine. Take for example my country of Ecuador. I'd find it hard to believe that any tech company is paying taxes in Ecuador and yet their citizens reap vast uses and benefits from Google/Facebook. I'm guessing this applies to 99% of other countries as well. I'm of a libertarian skew, so most taxes are essentially theft to keep the fat bureaucracy happy. In the case of the EU it's clear extortion.
SunShiranui 9y ago
And leave one of the biggest markets in the world? Why would they?
- whb07 9y ago
  Why would they be leaving it? I can easily connect to a Russian website with servers in Moscow just fine from anywhere in the world. The same applies to EU citizens. I'm a strong believer in freedom, to include freedom from unnecessary taxation. If G/F "leaves" EU, I meant it by closing physical locations and the farce they have to put up with for taxes, they could still serve citizens from EU. Id love to see the story unfold if G/F said "we are American companies only going to pay US taxes" and they quickly closed offices in EU. Do you think EU would create a firewall removing citizens from Facebook/instagram/Gmail/Google search etc ? Seems to me that in this crazy scenario the EU crooked politicians are left making threats they can't really follow through. They all probably use gmail and how easy is it exactly to start a new on an email account ? How about all your contacts and pictures on FB? Seems to me that in this world F/G would operate just the same and EU politicians would walk away crying saying "you can't do that it's not fair "
  - lovich 9y ago
    Is unnecessary taxation all taxation? By your argument every company should just find whatever the lowest tax area of the world is and set up their headquarters there, no one will be able to stop them! Also, if you believe in freedom, why don't you believe that countries have the freedom to stop these massive corporations from extracting wealth from their society and returning nothing? Why does only the corporations freedom matter?
    - whb07 9y ago
      Corporations don't have money. It's also a giant cat and mouse game, governments want to tax and companies want to minimize that. So you end up with weird situations like Apple and Google hoarding cash because they don't know how to put it to work and they sure as shit don't want to lose it to the taxman[0]. So if you substantially lowered or entirely removed corporate taxes they would bring that money back to the US and spend it in R&D or capital investments, or return it in large forms to shareholders via dividends! What oh what, do people usually do when they get sudden influxes of cash? They spend it or re invest it! They don't just bury it or burn the cash for warmth like Pablo Escobar. That seems like a better end goal than having the cash idly sitting abroad or being spent by crooked politicians who by virtue of being in office propose to be holier than thou and always manage to spend money not earned by themselves
ionised 9y ago
Google and Facebook have a lot more to lose than the EU in this regard, which is why they will eventually submit to whatever the EU deems reasonable. They are never going to withdraw from the EU. The money they would lose would be immense. The fact that people think Google and Facebook have this kind of power over a developed market of 500 million people is hilarious.
- whb07 9y ago
  They don't have offices and don't pay taxes for 99% of countries. I don't see you standing up for the sovereign rights of the people from French Guiana or Egypt or Sudan. You see it just so happens that the full breadth of services offered by Facebook and Google are available essentially with a simple internet connection. I'd dare say you could sign up for Gmail and Facebook as a scientist living in Antártica and who owns that? It just so happens that the EU machinery is very well adept at being strong enforcers of taxation, in the very same way that you might see the Mafia send in a couple of guys to physically threaten you if you don't pay your debts. Bravo to them, I guess?
  - ionised 9y ago
    I'm not even sure what point you are trying to make with this rant other than what sounds like tax is theft. Would you rather multinationals were not taxed at all? If something is tricky to get right is it not worth doing at all? If that's what you believe you're not going to find many on your side.
    - vixen99 9y ago
      I think we can see how you define 'rant'.
    - fooster 9y ago
      I find the idea of no corporate tax pretty appealing yes.
    - whb07 9y ago
      First, let's establish some basic points. Governments don't have money, people do. Companies don't have money, people do. In the case of government, it taxes the money to get funds to spend in its activities. In the case of companies, the investors and employees are the ones who own that money. If you hold those basic tenets true, then why deal with taxing moneyless companies? If you're to look at the breakdown of stock ownership in a large public company you would find that it's large funds comprised millions of people's savings which really own Apple and Google. If an Italian man owns Google stock then yeah he should be taxed according to the rules of the society he lives in. But why should the working grandmother in Idaho have to pay EU taxes as she owns a 0.000001% ownership or whatever in Google? In what rational world is that "fair"? If you were to remove corporate taxes, more money would flow directly back to those who own the public company(in the form of dividends) or be invested back into R&D or more employees. If we assume that our Idaho grandmother would get an extra $400 bucks in the form of a cheque from Google paying dividends, then maybe she could travel to Europe and spend more money directly than would have been possible had EU taxed Google. Or, Grandma's investments would grow along with the funds of institutional investors who would have more capital and would love to invest elsewhere. So there would be more capital looking to be placed and you come up with a smart idea and get funded. Suddenly you create a new giant company in the heat of Europe(I'm guessing you're European?) and employ thousands of people which would otherwise be home with parents working temp jobs and being stifled by a deep bureaucracy in Brussels that keeps getting bigger and fatter every year!
Oletros 9y ago
And next Apple or Amazon leaving the EU?

by whb07 9y ago

Thiez 9y ago

Do you honestly think that without US companies, there will be no search engines and social networks? Here in the Netherlands we had Hyves[1] before we had Facebook, which was pretty big. If, for whatever reason, Facebook were to vanish tomorrow from the EU tomorrow, I have little doubt that we'd all be on a different social network by Christmas. Of course there would be a lot of complaining during the first two weeks. I would miss Google more than I would Facebook, but perhaps an influx of 500 million new users would give competing search engines the income to improve their results to equal those of Google (perhaps they're already of comparable quality and I just haven't noticed). Google and Facebook are making a lot of money in the EU, and leaving the EU because they have to pay more taxes would be like cutting off the nose to spite the face. It just wouldn't make financial sense, and shareholders would (understandably) be furious. [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyves https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyves

whb07 9y ago
I didn't say they would truly close their doors to EU business. Very much the same way they operate in most of the world, that they should apply that to the EU. Google/Facebook don't have offices in over 100+ countries and yet they clearly serve those consumers from those countries just fine. Take for example my country of Ecuador. I'd find it hard to believe that any tech company is paying taxes in Ecuador and yet their citizens reap vast uses and benefits from Google/Facebook. I'm guessing this applies to 99% of other countries as well. I'm of a libertarian skew, so most taxes are essentially theft to keep the fat bureaucracy happy. In the case of the EU it's clear extortion.

SunShiranui 9y ago

And leave one of the biggest markets in the world? Why would they?

whb07 9y ago
Why would they be leaving it? I can easily connect to a Russian website with servers in Moscow just fine from anywhere in the world. The same applies to EU citizens. I'm a strong believer in freedom, to include freedom from unnecessary taxation. If G/F "leaves" EU, I meant it by closing physical locations and the farce they have to put up with for taxes, they could still serve citizens from EU. Id love to see the story unfold if G/F said "we are American companies only going to pay US taxes" and they quickly closed offices in EU. Do you think EU would create a firewall removing citizens from Facebook/instagram/Gmail/Google search etc ? Seems to me that in this crazy scenario the EU crooked politicians are left making threats they can't really follow through. They all probably use gmail and how easy is it exactly to start a new on an email account ? How about all your contacts and pictures on FB? Seems to me that in this world F/G would operate just the same and EU politicians would walk away crying saying "you can't do that it's not fair "
- lovich 9y ago
  Is unnecessary taxation all taxation? By your argument every company should just find whatever the lowest tax area of the world is and set up their headquarters there, no one will be able to stop them! Also, if you believe in freedom, why don't you believe that countries have the freedom to stop these massive corporations from extracting wealth from their society and returning nothing? Why does only the corporations freedom matter?
  - whb07 9y ago
    Corporations don't have money. It's also a giant cat and mouse game, governments want to tax and companies want to minimize that. So you end up with weird situations like Apple and Google hoarding cash because they don't know how to put it to work and they sure as shit don't want to lose it to the taxman[0]. So if you substantially lowered or entirely removed corporate taxes they would bring that money back to the US and spend it in R&D or capital investments, or return it in large forms to shareholders via dividends! What oh what, do people usually do when they get sudden influxes of cash? They spend it or re invest it! They don't just bury it or burn the cash for warmth like Pablo Escobar. That seems like a better end goal than having the cash idly sitting abroad or being spent by crooked politicians who by virtue of being in office propose to be holier than thou and always manage to spend money not earned by themselves

ionised 9y ago

Google and Facebook have a lot more to lose than the EU in this regard, which is why they will eventually submit to whatever the EU deems reasonable. They are never going to withdraw from the EU. The money they would lose would be immense. The fact that people think Google and Facebook have this kind of power over a developed market of 500 million people is hilarious.

whb07 9y ago
They don't have offices and don't pay taxes for 99% of countries. I don't see you standing up for the sovereign rights of the people from French Guiana or Egypt or Sudan. You see it just so happens that the full breadth of services offered by Facebook and Google are available essentially with a simple internet connection. I'd dare say you could sign up for Gmail and Facebook as a scientist living in Antártica and who owns that? It just so happens that the EU machinery is very well adept at being strong enforcers of taxation, in the very same way that you might see the Mafia send in a couple of guys to physically threaten you if you don't pay your debts. Bravo to them, I guess?
- ionised 9y ago
  I'm not even sure what point you are trying to make with this rant other than what sounds like tax is theft. Would you rather multinationals were not taxed at all? If something is tricky to get right is it not worth doing at all? If that's what you believe you're not going to find many on your side.
  - vixen99 9y ago
    I think we can see how you define 'rant'.
  - fooster 9y ago
    I find the idea of no corporate tax pretty appealing yes.
  - whb07 9y ago
    First, let's establish some basic points. Governments don't have money, people do. Companies don't have money, people do. In the case of government, it taxes the money to get funds to spend in its activities. In the case of companies, the investors and employees are the ones who own that money. If you hold those basic tenets true, then why deal with taxing moneyless companies? If you're to look at the breakdown of stock ownership in a large public company you would find that it's large funds comprised millions of people's savings which really own Apple and Google. If an Italian man owns Google stock then yeah he should be taxed according to the rules of the society he lives in. But why should the working grandmother in Idaho have to pay EU taxes as she owns a 0.000001% ownership or whatever in Google? In what rational world is that "fair"? If you were to remove corporate taxes, more money would flow directly back to those who own the public company(in the form of dividends) or be invested back into R&D or more employees. If we assume that our Idaho grandmother would get an extra $400 bucks in the form of a cheque from Google paying dividends, then maybe she could travel to Europe and spend more money directly than would have been possible had EU taxed Google. Or, Grandma's investments would grow along with the funds of institutional investors who would have more capital and would love to invest elsewhere. So there would be more capital looking to be placed and you come up with a smart idea and get funded. Suddenly you create a new giant company in the heat of Europe(I'm guessing you're European?) and employ thousands of people which would otherwise be home with parents working temp jobs and being stifled by a deep bureaucracy in Brussels that keeps getting bigger and fatter every year!

Oletros 9y ago

And next Apple or Amazon leaving the EU?