3 ms·

"Anyone may arrange his affairs so that his taxes shall be as low as possible; he is not bound to choose that pattern which best pays the treasury. There is not

"Anyone may arrange his affairs so that his taxes shall be as low as possible; he is not bound to choose that pattern which best pays the treasury. There is not even a patriotic duty to increase one's taxes. Over and over again the Courts have said that there is nothing sinister in so arranging affairs as to keep taxes as low as possible. Everyone does it, rich and poor alike and all do right, for nobody owes any public duty to pay more than the law demands." - Judge Learned Hand

prawn 13y ago
What was the state of globalisation with respect to arranging businesses to minimise tax at the time of that comment? (Genuine question.) Would sentiment among the public or pros have changed with the times?
- will_brown 13y ago
  The use of differing tax laws between two or more countries to try to mitigate tax liability is probably as old as taxation itself. In Ancient Greece, some of the Greek Islands were used as depositories by the sea traders of the era to place their foreign goods to thus avoid the two-percent tax imposed by the city-state of Athens on imported goods. In 1721, American colonies traded from Latin America to avoid British taxes. In addition, the pilgrims from the Mayflower Pilgrims were not individuals fleeing religious persecution, they were given a "patent" or license by the King of England to settle Virginia, they were actually corporate recruits and given stock in the company in exchange for the risk they took to settle the New World with all assets (crops, livestock, ect...) to be owned by the company. I am not sure if sentiment about taxation has ever changed over time, going to the Bible and Jesus was betrayed by Judas, a tax collector, the disciples vilified Judas before he became a disciple. Then again Jesus himself in relation to taxation may have said render unto Caesar what is Caesar's for ours is the Kingdom of heaven. Sure you have people like Warren Buffet publicly claiming they are willing to pay more, but the reality is nothing is currently stopping him from paying more, he does not need a law mandating him to pay more, he could take it upon himself to pay a flat tax of 35% across the board, but he does not, he still pays less than his secretary. Otherwise as of late the US has helped lower corporate taxation through the advent of the "election to be taxed as a small corporation" (S-election) and the more recent advent of the LLC, both of which which offer a single taxation structure down from the double taxation of your standard corporation.

prawn 13y ago

What was the state of globalisation with respect to arranging businesses to minimise tax at the time of that comment? (Genuine question.) Would sentiment among the public or pros have changed with the times?

will_brown 13y ago
The use of differing tax laws between two or more countries to try to mitigate tax liability is probably as old as taxation itself. In Ancient Greece, some of the Greek Islands were used as depositories by the sea traders of the era to place their foreign goods to thus avoid the two-percent tax imposed by the city-state of Athens on imported goods. In 1721, American colonies traded from Latin America to avoid British taxes. In addition, the pilgrims from the Mayflower Pilgrims were not individuals fleeing religious persecution, they were given a "patent" or license by the King of England to settle Virginia, they were actually corporate recruits and given stock in the company in exchange for the risk they took to settle the New World with all assets (crops, livestock, ect...) to be owned by the company. I am not sure if sentiment about taxation has ever changed over time, going to the Bible and Jesus was betrayed by Judas, a tax collector, the disciples vilified Judas before he became a disciple. Then again Jesus himself in relation to taxation may have said render unto Caesar what is Caesar's for ours is the Kingdom of heaven. Sure you have people like Warren Buffet publicly claiming they are willing to pay more, but the reality is nothing is currently stopping him from paying more, he does not need a law mandating him to pay more, he could take it upon himself to pay a flat tax of 35% across the board, but he does not, he still pays less than his secretary. Otherwise as of late the US has helped lower corporate taxation through the advent of the "election to be taxed as a small corporation" (S-election) and the more recent advent of the LLC, both of which which offer a single taxation structure down from the double taxation of your standard corporation.