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If FB moves all their operations out if the EU, how does the EU tax a company? Presumably EU companies can do business with non-EU companies without the other c

If FB moves all their operations out if the EU, how does the EU tax a company? Presumably EU companies can do business with non-EU companies without the other company having an EU presence? Genuinely curious. Not sure how this works as I'm not a bizguy.

JumpCrisscross 9y ago
> If FB moves all their operations out if the EU, how does the EU tax a company? If Facebook moved its servers and personnel out of the EU to avoid complying with EU law, I'd fully expect--and support--the EU to (a) punitively taxing EU businesses buying Facebook ads, (b) banning EU businesses from buying said ads, (c) extraditing Facebook executives to the EU and then (d) blocking Facebook in the EU. No jurisdiction reacts kindly to brazen, willful criminality.
- adventured 9y ago
  What that setup describes is a required implementation of the Chinese firewall and vast Internet controls by the EU over all persons within the EU. There's no other way to enforce such a scheme otherwise, you have to know all about user & business Internet use. Option C would never happen. Option D requires the Chinese firewall, very obviously. It's very aggressively courting fascism, practically begging for it; a return to militant European fascism would be the sole possible outcome over time. It would turn the EU into a walled garden network, which is constantly railed against in regards to Facebook.
  - JumpCrisscross 9y ago
    > What that setup describes is a required implementation of the Chinese firewall No, it does not. China's firewall is designed to keep broad swaths of information away from its citizens. An EU block would be designed to put Facebook, and only Facebook, at a strikingly material disadvantage on the Continent. The former must be comprehensive, the latter narrow. In any case, we're describing a technical solution to a legal problem. If someone believes European courts could not get their pound of flesh from Facebook, that is the definition of arrogance.
- joesb 9y ago
  So if some new chinese website becomes globally popular, the EU will try to prevent its business from paying money or buying ads from such company?
  - JumpCrisscross 9y ago
    > if some new chinese website becomes globally popular, the EU will try to prevent its business from paying money or buying ads from such company? This is a red herring. The hypothetical involved Facebook, a company serving European users and with equipment and people in Europe, reacting to European regulation by moving said equipment and people out of Europe while continuing to serve the same Europeans. That is skipping jurisdiction. Given such a blatant attempt to skip the law, while still doing what the law was designed to prevent, one expects enforcement. A comparable hypothetical would be an American company reacting to an American law by moving its people and servers to Canada while keeping all its American users and then saying "we're no longer in America, you can't touch us."
- return1 9y ago
  I 'm in the EU and i don't understand this animosity. Maybe because i don't use facebook, but i support people's rights to have access and use whatever they want. I 'm not even concerned much about facebook , i m more concerned that many of my country's public services, small businesses, banks and even political organizations don't comply with gdpr.
PeterisP 9y ago
They can seize money transfers en route to Facebook from their EU customers. Facebook receives billions of advertising revenue from Europe (IIRC some 25% of their global revenue), all that money can be trivially seized by authorities, they just need to file the proper request. Furthermore, there are international agreements on cooperation against tax evasion; I'm not aware of the details for this process but I assume that they could and would use the USA legal system to enforce collection of legitimate debts.
keithnz 9y ago
I'm no expert, and I'm not 100% sure what the EU can do, but its not about the EU taxing them, it's all about minimizing paying tax in any country, but say if it was purely US based, it wouldn't have the benefits of its Irish tax avoidance system that everyone seems to use. It would be all exposed to being taxed in the US which I believe would cost a lot more.
return1 9y ago
Of course you can do business with non-EU companies, and the bilateral laws between the two countries apply. Having an EU presence gives tax advantages and a centralized way to avoid dealing with each EU country separately.

JumpCrisscross 9y ago

> If FB moves all their operations out if the EU, how does the EU tax a company? If Facebook moved its servers and personnel out of the EU to avoid complying with EU law, I'd fully expect--and support--the EU to (a) punitively taxing EU businesses buying Facebook ads, (b) banning EU businesses from buying said ads, (c) extraditing Facebook executives to the EU and then (d) blocking Facebook in the EU. No jurisdiction reacts kindly to brazen, willful criminality.

adventured 9y ago
What that setup describes is a required implementation of the Chinese firewall and vast Internet controls by the EU over all persons within the EU. There's no other way to enforce such a scheme otherwise, you have to know all about user & business Internet use. Option C would never happen. Option D requires the Chinese firewall, very obviously. It's very aggressively courting fascism, practically begging for it; a return to militant European fascism would be the sole possible outcome over time. It would turn the EU into a walled garden network, which is constantly railed against in regards to Facebook.
- JumpCrisscross 9y ago
  > What that setup describes is a required implementation of the Chinese firewall No, it does not. China's firewall is designed to keep broad swaths of information away from its citizens. An EU block would be designed to put Facebook, and only Facebook, at a strikingly material disadvantage on the Continent. The former must be comprehensive, the latter narrow. In any case, we're describing a technical solution to a legal problem. If someone believes European courts could not get their pound of flesh from Facebook, that is the definition of arrogance.
joesb 9y ago
So if some new chinese website becomes globally popular, the EU will try to prevent its business from paying money or buying ads from such company?
- JumpCrisscross 9y ago
  > if some new chinese website becomes globally popular, the EU will try to prevent its business from paying money or buying ads from such company? This is a red herring. The hypothetical involved Facebook, a company serving European users and with equipment and people in Europe, reacting to European regulation by moving said equipment and people out of Europe while continuing to serve the same Europeans. That is skipping jurisdiction. Given such a blatant attempt to skip the law, while still doing what the law was designed to prevent, one expects enforcement. A comparable hypothetical would be an American company reacting to an American law by moving its people and servers to Canada while keeping all its American users and then saying "we're no longer in America, you can't touch us."
return1 9y ago
I 'm in the EU and i don't understand this animosity. Maybe because i don't use facebook, but i support people's rights to have access and use whatever they want. I 'm not even concerned much about facebook , i m more concerned that many of my country's public services, small businesses, banks and even political organizations don't comply with gdpr.

PeterisP 9y ago

They can seize money transfers en route to Facebook from their EU customers. Facebook receives billions of advertising revenue from Europe (IIRC some 25% of their global revenue), all that money can be trivially seized by authorities, they just need to file the proper request. Furthermore, there are international agreements on cooperation against tax evasion; I'm not aware of the details for this process but I assume that they could and would use the USA legal system to enforce collection of legitimate debts.

keithnz 9y ago

I'm no expert, and I'm not 100% sure what the EU can do, but its not about the EU taxing them, it's all about minimizing paying tax in any country, but say if it was purely US based, it wouldn't have the benefits of its Irish tax avoidance system that everyone seems to use. It would be all exposed to being taxed in the US which I believe would cost a lot more.

return1 9y ago

Of course you can do business with non-EU companies, and the bilateral laws between the two countries apply. Having an EU presence gives tax advantages and a centralized way to avoid dealing with each EU country separately.