4 ms·

> Neither you nor I determine the course of the national discourse. Only Mr. Trump has the power of the bully pulpit I'm not sure what's you point here. This i

by 21 9y ago

> Neither you nor I determine the course of the national discourse. Only Mr. Trump has the power of the bully pulpit I'm not sure what's you point here. This is what the US president does (unlike other countries) - has a lot of power to directly intervene in many places. This is what voters expect from him, and this is the issue on his mind. Amazon is not the only one abusing the USPS. Chinese companies like AliExpress do the same thing all over the world, taking advantage of national post services to ship a 50 penny screw free from China to UK for example. https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/storyline/wp/2014/09/12/the-postal-service-is-losing-millions-a-year-to-help-you-buy-cheap-stuff-from-china/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/storyline/wp/2014/09/12/...

dragontamer 9y ago
> I'm not sure what's you point here. My point is that Mr. Trump is not talking about the double irish with a dutch sandwich loophole. He never has, and probably never will. Mr. Trump had an opportunity to fix it in last year's tax overhaul. But he turned a blind eye to the well known tax issue. Therefore, your earlier statement: > We all know how the big tech companies pay basically zero tax by elaborate international tax reduction schemes. is... well... I agree with it. Companies shouldn't be abusing the double irish with a dutch sandwich loophole. But our President is ignoring the issue. And therefore, neither you nor I can do anything about it.
- 21 9y ago
  > But our President is ignoring the issue. And therefore, neither you nor I can do anything about it. Actually we could do something about it. People don't want to buy from companies which use child labour or which destroy the environment. Thus you have all tech companies painting themselves as green as possible. We are already seeing a trend in people demanding that companies support the "local economy". I think it's just a matter of time until they will demand for them to also pay "local taxes". And then you'll see this page appear on the Internet: https://www.apple.com/taxes/ https://www.apple.com/taxes/, just like this one which exists today: https://www.apple.com/environment/ https://www.apple.com/environment/
- mistermann 9y ago
  I would like to see you address the AliExpress free worldwide shipping point please.
  - dragontamer 9y ago
    Why? Mr. Trump is only talking about Amazon and USPS at the moment. https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/980063581592047617 https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/98006358159204761... If Mr. Trump were complaining about Alibaba or even doing something about it, maybe then I'll chime in on that discussion. Otherwise, it seems kind of irrelevant to the greater discussion that our President is putting forth. Unless you think that Mr. Trump, the FCC or the other powers that be are actually doing something about the Alibaba thingy? Or that Mr. Trump even cares about this issue at all: http://a.abcnews.com/images/Business/abc_donald_trump_made_in_china_products_dm_110428_wmain_4x3_608.jpg http://a.abcnews.com/images/Business/abc_donald_trump_made_i... The only reason Mr. Trump is talking about Amazon is because Jeff Bezos owns Washington Post, and Mr. Trump doesn't like the articles that WashPo are running. When Mr. Trump stops using Chinese labor, and his own company stops abusing these same rules... then maybe I'll trust that he's taking the issue seriously. If your point is that you support tariffs on China for unfair practices, then I agree with you. The part where I stop agreeing with Mr. Trump is where these tariffs start to affect US Allies (ie: Canada, Australia, UK), or close US Trading Partners (Europe, Mexico, etc. etc.).
    - mistermann 9y ago
      > Why? Because I'm interested in human psychology, kind of as a hobby. I find it fun to observe how people become incredibly righteously indignant on what they think is a principled basis "But he turned a blind eye to the well known tax issue" and then do the very same thing. Donald Trump cherry picking = bad, you = ok. I also find it interesting to interact with people who think they can read minds: "The only reason Mr. Trump is talking about Amazon is because Jeff Bezos owns Washington Post, and Mr. Trump doesn't like the articles that WashPo are running." > If your point is that you support tariffs on China for unfair practices, then I agree with you. The part where I stop agreeing with Mr. Trump is where these tariffs start to affect US Allies (ie: Canada, Australia, UK), or close US Trading Partners (Europe, Mexico, etc. etc.). I support fairness + pragmatism. China was given extremely favorable tariff treatment as they were developing, but they are now far, far beyond the development phase and it is well past the time that tariffs are normalized, as well as other unfair advantages fixed (free worldwide shipping subsidized by mostly Western postal services, like USPS). But to listen to the typical fresh out of school HN expert armchair economists, current tariffs are "just right", as if they never change, and never need to change to accommodate changing conditions. In other words, they are incredibly ignorant of history (such as Obama's similar actions....where were the dire Smoot-Hawley warnings then?), but even worse, their emotions related to the topic seems to have disabled their plain old common common sense.

by 21 9y ago

dragontamer 9y ago

> I'm not sure what's you point here. My point is that Mr. Trump is not talking about the double irish with a dutch sandwich loophole. He never has, and probably never will. Mr. Trump had an opportunity to fix it in last year's tax overhaul. But he turned a blind eye to the well known tax issue. Therefore, your earlier statement: > We all know how the big tech companies pay basically zero tax by elaborate international tax reduction schemes. is... well... I agree with it. Companies shouldn't be abusing the double irish with a dutch sandwich loophole. But our President is ignoring the issue. And therefore, neither you nor I can do anything about it.

21 9y ago
> But our President is ignoring the issue. And therefore, neither you nor I can do anything about it. Actually we could do something about it. People don't want to buy from companies which use child labour or which destroy the environment. Thus you have all tech companies painting themselves as green as possible. We are already seeing a trend in people demanding that companies support the "local economy". I think it's just a matter of time until they will demand for them to also pay "local taxes". And then you'll see this page appear on the Internet: https://www.apple.com/taxes/ https://www.apple.com/taxes/, just like this one which exists today: https://www.apple.com/environment/ https://www.apple.com/environment/
mistermann 9y ago
I would like to see you address the AliExpress free worldwide shipping point please.
- dragontamer 9y ago
  Why? Mr. Trump is only talking about Amazon and USPS at the moment. https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/980063581592047617 https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/98006358159204761... If Mr. Trump were complaining about Alibaba or even doing something about it, maybe then I'll chime in on that discussion. Otherwise, it seems kind of irrelevant to the greater discussion that our President is putting forth. Unless you think that Mr. Trump, the FCC or the other powers that be are actually doing something about the Alibaba thingy? Or that Mr. Trump even cares about this issue at all: http://a.abcnews.com/images/Business/abc_donald_trump_made_in_china_products_dm_110428_wmain_4x3_608.jpg http://a.abcnews.com/images/Business/abc_donald_trump_made_i... The only reason Mr. Trump is talking about Amazon is because Jeff Bezos owns Washington Post, and Mr. Trump doesn't like the articles that WashPo are running. When Mr. Trump stops using Chinese labor, and his own company stops abusing these same rules... then maybe I'll trust that he's taking the issue seriously. If your point is that you support tariffs on China for unfair practices, then I agree with you. The part where I stop agreeing with Mr. Trump is where these tariffs start to affect US Allies (ie: Canada, Australia, UK), or close US Trading Partners (Europe, Mexico, etc. etc.).
  - mistermann 9y ago
    > Why? Because I'm interested in human psychology, kind of as a hobby. I find it fun to observe how people become incredibly righteously indignant on what they think is a principled basis "But he turned a blind eye to the well known tax issue" and then do the very same thing. Donald Trump cherry picking = bad, you = ok. I also find it interesting to interact with people who think they can read minds: "The only reason Mr. Trump is talking about Amazon is because Jeff Bezos owns Washington Post, and Mr. Trump doesn't like the articles that WashPo are running." > If your point is that you support tariffs on China for unfair practices, then I agree with you. The part where I stop agreeing with Mr. Trump is where these tariffs start to affect US Allies (ie: Canada, Australia, UK), or close US Trading Partners (Europe, Mexico, etc. etc.). I support fairness + pragmatism. China was given extremely favorable tariff treatment as they were developing, but they are now far, far beyond the development phase and it is well past the time that tariffs are normalized, as well as other unfair advantages fixed (free worldwide shipping subsidized by mostly Western postal services, like USPS). But to listen to the typical fresh out of school HN expert armchair economists, current tariffs are "just right", as if they never change, and never need to change to accommodate changing conditions. In other words, they are incredibly ignorant of history (such as Obama's similar actions....where were the dire Smoot-Hawley warnings then?), but even worse, their emotions related to the topic seems to have disabled their plain old common common sense.