4 ms·

These loopholes abuse the tax codes of multiple nations. They absolutely are loopholes that ignore the spirit of the law.

• charlesdm 9y ago
  Honestly, to me, the law has no spirit. The law having a spirit would mean we have to depend on ethical beliefs, and those can be wildly different for every person and/or company. What seems like an acceptable rate of taxation to pay for person A seems outrageous for B, and both rates would probably seem outrageous anyway to both those people if they have to pay those abroad (e.g. not in the home country of the main shareholders) Let's just stick to the letter of the law -- things are complicated enough as is. Edit: and for those who haven't noticed, member states introduce some of these "loopholes" on purpose in order to attract incoming investment. For example: there is a reason the Netherlands does not levy withholding taxes on 1) royalties and 2) outgoing dividends. They do this so people and companies would book some profit there so they can then tax it.
  • glitcher 9y ago
    > the law has no spirit. The law having a spirit would mean we have to depend on ethical beliefs The law is also not a set of boolean logic statements. The "spirit" is just a way of acknowledging that language is imprecise at best, and often laws are poorly written to begin with.
    • charlesdm 9y ago
      So you're saying we should give politicians a pass for making low quality laws but punish (smart) citizens and corporations for finding a way around it?
      • glitcher 9y ago
        Not at all. My point is that it is disingenuous to treat laws as if they are mathematical equations.
  • alphaalpha101 9y ago
    You are simply wrong. The spirit of the law does exist. It's a concept well established in legal analysis.