Stop talking in financial porno slang “double Irish” and alike. There are no loopholes or whatsoever. Apple has some difficulties in repatriating international profits, any tax over those profits belongs to US. EU just makes an attempt to see “how much we can rob of those profits”. Applying the executive power retroactively is against universal law, French Conséil d’Etat will most probably reverse this.
I'm not sure which country you are from, but looking at high quality health care and affordable education provided in most of the European Union, it bears evidence that high taxes, when used the right way, do pay social dividends.
Complete baloney. The ONLY reason the EU has the social programs it has is because the EU members have NO military budgets to speak of. Instead the EU relies on the United States to protect it from the Russian Bear, the Middle East Islamic radicals. If the U.S. pulled out militarily from the EU and NATO those countries would have no choice but to dramatically increase their military budgets and those social programs would suffer big time. For over 70 years now the U.S. has spent its treasure to keep the peace in Europe.
Apple should immediately raise all prices on all products and services in France by at least 10% to compensate for this Frenchy tax.
Samsung would appreciate that very much.
Apple doesn't need to compete on price with anybody. There will always be other things out there that are cheaper. Those people who want Apple devices will buy Apple devices. And those that don't want, can buy something else.
Complete baloney. The ONLY reason the EU has the social programs it has is because the EU members have NO military budgets to speak of. Instead the EU relies on the United States to protect it from the Russian Bear, the Middle East Islamic radicals. If the U.S. pulled out militarily from the EU and NATO those countries would have no choice but to dramatically increase their military budgets and those social programs would suffer big time. For over 70 years now the U.S. has spent its treasure to keep the peace in Europe.
I agree, and what do we get for it?
We are spending good money to protect govts and people that don't like us.
So does this mean prices in France for services will raise 3%? If so, how does this help the customer?
Pretty sure that's exactly what it's going to mean. This is how most corporations, Apple included, price their products. Within a margin of error the price for an iPhone is the US price converted at something like the current exchange rate plus local taxes and any other tariffs. When Apple works out what's going to get taxed and what generates that revenue, they'll add the 3% on. So France just took more money out of its citizens' pockets.
To the poster earlier in the thread who complained that ever increasing taxation is a symptom of lazy and greedy government, couldn't agree more. The levels of taxation almost everywhere, and the numerous places along the chain they are charged (income, sale, interest on already taxed income, gains on things bought with already-taxed income and then death duties) have become totally usurious.
I am surprised that it took EU countries this long to enact these kinds of taxes. It’s common knowledge that Apple (with help from Ireland) took advantage of loopholes in international tax laws to reduce their tax burden. Of course, Apple has done nothing illegal, but it’s completely within each country’s rights to change tax laws to close those loopholes.
So imagine if every UN country charged Apple an additional 3% on gross revenue.
Like states charge sales tax here? It’s a pain to collect and pass along all those different taxes, sure, but Apple is certainly capable of doing so. And making it prominently displayed on receipts and on ordering pages in the online store. Let the consumers know that this is a tax their government is imposing upon their purchase. Collect it and pass it along. Will it impact sales? Sending potential customers to other brands? Not so much in the case of Apple; Apple’s quality, resale value, performance, lack of malware and viruses, privacy protection, better user experience, and ecosystem means the brand is very sticky and price inelastic. No worries.
A 3% tax on gross revenue, rather than profit, is an exceptionally poor idea, even for the French. Will the US respond with a 3% revenue tax on champagne?
But it might be preferable for companies. It’s hard to identify and therefore pass on tax from profit at the time of a sale. But revenue is simple. Just add the 3% as a line item on the receipt or order page. You want Apple Music, here’s the price plus an extra 3% French digital services tax your government has dictated you pay. Same for iCloud data, App Store sales, whatever the government says the tax applies to.
I am surprised that it took EU countries this long to enact these kinds of taxes. It’s common knowledge that Apple (with help from Ireland) took advantage of loopholes in international tax laws to reduce their tax burden. Of course, Apple has done nothing illegal, but it’s completely within each country’s rights to change tax laws to close those loopholes.
So imagine if every UN country charged Apple an additional 3% on gross revenue.
Where would the problem be? It's a decision each sovereign state must weigh up. And in this case it isn't 'Apple', it's companies that go above a specific limit.
Taxing revenues is unheard of. And stupid. Only pre-tax profits are typically taxed.
If a company like Walmart or GM were taxed at 3% of revenues, they’d have no profits left. This ill-advised EU move opens up a completely new front in a likely serious trade war.
I predict they’ll have to back off.
It’s just another sales tax. See my comments above.
I am surprised that it took EU countries this long to enact these kinds of taxes. It’s common knowledge that Apple (with help from Ireland) took advantage of loopholes in international tax laws to reduce their tax burden. Of course, Apple has done nothing illegal, but it’s completely within each country’s rights to change tax laws to close those loopholes.
So imagine if every UN country charged Apple an additional 3% on gross revenue.
Where would the problem be? It's a decision each sovereign state must weigh up. And in this case it isn't 'Apple', it's companies that go above a specific limit.
Taxing revenues is unheard of. And stupid. Only pre-tax profits are typically taxed.
If a company like Walmart or GM were taxed at 3% of revenues, they’d have no profits left. This ill-advised EU move opens up a completely new front in a likely serious trade war.
I predict they’ll have to back off.
It’s just another sales tax. See my comments above.
Ignorant nonsense. Read the whole thread before spouting off. Including those that precede your supposedly smart “comment above”.
I am surprised that it took EU countries this long to enact these kinds of taxes. It’s common knowledge that Apple (with help from Ireland) took advantage of loopholes in international tax laws to reduce their tax burden. Of course, Apple has done nothing illegal, but it’s completely within each country’s rights to change tax laws to close those loopholes.
So imagine if every UN country charged Apple an additional 3% on gross revenue.
Where would the problem be? It's a decision each sovereign state must weigh up. And in this case it isn't 'Apple', it's companies that go above a specific limit.
Taxing revenues is unheard of. And stupid. Only pre-tax profits are typically taxed.
If a company like Walmart or GM were taxed at 3% of revenues, they’d have no profits left. This ill-advised EU move opens up a completely new front in a likely serious trade war.
I predict they’ll have to back off.
It’s just another sales tax. See my comments above.
It seems to differ from sales tax in the sense that it's not charged to the consumer during business operation but is charged at the end of year like income tax. Companies could of course raise prices in response but they can raise prices at any time just as they can in an attempt to avoid all tax but raising prices might allow competitors to undercut them and reduce their sales. While a 3% revenue tax could be damaging to a business, it gets offset against their corporate income tax, similar to how repatriation tax works:
If companies pay the expected amount of income tax, they won't notice a difference. It's a measure to prevent companies avoiding paying their corporate income tax. Companies are obviously irked by it because there are no loopholes to exploit here.
A 3% tax on gross revenue, rather than profit, is an exceptionally poor idea, even for the French. Will the US respond with a 3% revenue tax on champagne?
But it might be preferable for companies. It’s hard to identify and therefore pass on tax from profit at the time of a sale. But revenue is simple. Just add the 3% as a line item on the receipt or order page. You want Apple Music, here’s the price plus an extra 3% French digital services tax your government has dictated you pay. Same for iCloud data, App Store sales, whatever the government says the tax applies to.
I am afraid that this is not so simple. In Europe you cannot mislead consumers with prices. You cannot advertise prices without VAT to consumers. Price must include all taxes etc. This is in contrast with US when actual price determined at checkout (state, local sales tax added to sales price)
I'm not sure which country you are from, but looking at high quality health care and affordable education provided in most of the European Union, it bears evidence that high taxes, when used the right way, do pay social dividends.
Complete baloney. The ONLY reason the EU has the social programs it has is because the EU members have NO military budgets to speak of. Instead the EU relies on the United States to protect it from the Russian Bear, the Middle East Islamic radicals. If the U.S. pulled out militarily from the EU and NATO those countries would have no choice but to dramatically increase their military budgets and those social programs would suffer big time. For over 70 years now the U.S. has spent its treasure to keep the peace in Europe.
Now that is baloney. The absence of conflict in Europe is precisely because of the EU.
As for external threats and U.S 'protection', simply pull out of NATO if it costs too much!
That won't happen because the U.S wants to keep its military bases in Europe. It wants to continue selling arms. It needs NATO allies. Without them (however 'small' their financial contribution) the Gulf wars would not have been possible and with so much debt, the U.S is rapidly approaching a point where it might have hardware to parade around but no be able to use in actual conflict. Wars are expensive.
I'll take a balanced welfare state over any of that.
I am surprised that it took EU countries this long to enact these kinds of taxes. It’s common knowledge that Apple (with help from Ireland) took advantage of loopholes in international tax laws to reduce their tax burden. Of course, Apple has done nothing illegal, but it’s completely within each country’s rights to change tax laws to close those loopholes.
So imagine if every UN country charged Apple an additional 3% on revenue.
It's not clear to me if the 3% tax would be on all of Apple's revenue or just its services revenue. Is it clear to others?
It's on sales, so hardware and software and even cloud (if someone buys extra cloud storage for example).
Additional tax is always a bad thing. It would be better to lower tax on individuals and local companies to a comparable amount. It's also a common mistake to think that a government has the right to induce taxes. Human rights are very clear on this: taxes can only be induced for a specific purpose because of a specific need and on a temporary basis (say a year or so) and must be re-evaluated every time.
I'm not sure which country you are from, but looking at high quality health care and affordable education provided in most of the European Union, it bears evidence that high taxes, when used the right way, do pay social dividends.
Complete baloney. The ONLY reason the EU has the social programs it has is because the EU members have NO military budgets to speak of. Instead the EU relies on the United States to protect it from the Russian Bear, the Middle East Islamic radicals. If the U.S. pulled out militarily from the EU and NATO those countries would have no choice but to dramatically increase their military budgets and those social programs would suffer big time. For over 70 years now the U.S. has spent its treasure to keep the peace in Europe.
Now that is baloney. The absence of conflict in Europe is precisely because of the EU.
As for external threats and U.S 'protection', simply pull out of NATO if it costs too much!
That won't happen because the U.S wants to keep its military bases in Europe. It wants to continue selling arms. It needs NATO allies. Without them (however 'small' their financial contribution) the Gulf wars would not have been possible and with so much debt, the U.S is rapidly approaching a point where it might have hardware to parade around but no be able to use in actual conflict. Wars are expensive.
I'll take a balanced welfare state over any of that.
You're believing the spin from the Eurocrats I'm afraid, the EU has done NOTHING to prevent conflict in Europe. When Yugoslavia split and war broke out, including ethnic cleansing, it wasn't the EU that stopped it, it was NATO with the USA and UK at the forefront. As for the current ongoing war in the Ukraine, that's solely due to the EU courting the Ukraine to get them to join as part of their ongoing aggressive expansionist policy. Every observer pointed out that Russia would never allow Ukraine to join, but the EU persisted. Meanwhile there is civil unrest across Europe - weekly riots in France for months - and the rise of extremists on both left and right due to the EU's disasterous Euro policy. Economists warned back in the 90's that allowing countries with divergent economies to use a common currency would result in economic collapse, so rules were put in place to stop it. But when Eurocrats realised that Greece, Spain, Portugal, Italy and France would fail the test and be excluded from the Euro, they decided to ignore their own rules. As a result they set in train the sovereign debt crisis that erupted in 2009 and is still ongoing. The reason they did this was simple to trap these countries in the EU, leaving after having adopted the Euro would be nearly impossible.
The USA and Canda should consider a mutual defence pact with a smaller set of countries - the UK and France account for nearly 50% of ALL of europe's military capability. In the long term, the like of Macron in France and the Eurocrats in Brussels want to undermine NATO and rely more on an EU Army. The hilarious thing is they don't want to fund it properly, for example, Germany's armed forces reduced to a token force with most ships, aircraft, and submarines unsable due to repairs being required.
"The Greece population is effectively taken hostage by the EU and have to slave labour to earn the money the EU wants back."
Wrong.It was the Greek politicians who took too much credit, lived lavishly, sent their population to retirement at 55 whereas the Germans changed retirement age from 63 to 67. There were lots of lies and corruption at play. I am not defending EU, I dont like it either. But a lot of the Greek problems were made by the Greek politicians, and the Greek people are paying the price.
"I firmly believe the government can be run generously with a 10% income tax collection (and no sales tax). We just need to change our attitudes about tax and the responsibilities of the government."
Run, and generously? So wrong. It won't probably cover free medical for every citizen in a deveopled country. Oh, wait! USA doen'st provide free health care for all. "Pay 10% flat tax" is normally an argument from the high to very high income groups - nothing wrong about you here.
A non-married person earning 70K pays >45% in taxes, medicare, social insurances etc in Germany , sales taxes come on top of that. France should be not far from that. For that - medicare, education and many many others are free or close to free for all of the citizens. Its unaccepatable that big companies earning billions pay less than 10-15% through loopholes.
Comments
We are spending good money to protect govts and people that don't like us.
We should let them fend for themselves.
To the poster earlier in the thread who complained that ever increasing taxation is a symptom of lazy and greedy government, couldn't agree more. The levels of taxation almost everywhere, and the numerous places along the chain they are charged (income, sale, interest on already taxed income, gains on things bought with already-taxed income and then death duties) have become totally usurious.
https://home.kpmg/xx/en/home/insights/2019/03/tnf-france-draft-proposal-for-digital-services-tax.html
https://www.ey.com/Publication/vwLUAssets/French_Government_submits_draft_bill_on_digital_services_tax_to_Council_of_Ministers/$FILE/2019G_000737-19Gbl_Indirect_France - Draft bill on digital services tax.pdf
If companies pay the expected amount of income tax, they won't notice a difference. It's a measure to prevent companies avoiding paying their corporate income tax. Companies are obviously irked by it because there are no loopholes to exploit here.
I am afraid that this is not so simple. In Europe you cannot mislead consumers with prices. You cannot advertise prices without VAT to consumers. Price must include all taxes etc. This is in contrast with US when actual price determined at checkout (state, local sales tax added to sales price)
As for external threats and U.S 'protection', simply pull out of NATO if it costs too much!
That won't happen because the U.S wants to keep its military bases in Europe. It wants to continue selling arms. It needs NATO allies. Without them (however 'small' their financial contribution) the Gulf wars would not have been possible and with so much debt, the U.S is rapidly approaching a point where it might have hardware to parade around but no be able to use in actual conflict. Wars are expensive.
I'll take a balanced welfare state over any of that.
https://www.businessinsider.com/how-nato-budget-is-funded-2018-7
It would be better to lower tax on individuals and local companies to a comparable amount.
It's also a common mistake to think that a government has the right to induce taxes.
Human rights are very clear on this: taxes can only be induced for a specific purpose because of a specific need and on a temporary basis (say a year or so) and must be re-evaluated every time.
When Yugoslavia split and war broke out, including ethnic cleansing, it wasn't the EU that stopped it, it was NATO with the USA and UK at the forefront.
As for the current ongoing war in the Ukraine, that's solely due to the EU courting the Ukraine to get them to join as part of their ongoing aggressive expansionist policy. Every observer pointed out that Russia would never allow Ukraine to join, but the EU persisted.
Meanwhile there is civil unrest across Europe - weekly riots in France for months - and the rise of extremists on both left and right due to the EU's disasterous Euro policy. Economists warned back in the 90's that allowing countries with divergent economies to use a common currency would result in economic collapse, so rules were put in place to stop it. But when Eurocrats realised that Greece, Spain, Portugal, Italy and France would fail the test and be excluded from the Euro, they decided to ignore their own rules. As a result they set in train the sovereign debt crisis that erupted in 2009 and is still ongoing. The reason they did this was simple to trap these countries in the EU, leaving after having adopted the Euro would be nearly impossible.
The USA and Canda should consider a mutual defence pact with a smaller set of countries - the UK and France account for nearly 50% of ALL of europe's military capability. In the long term, the like of Macron in France and the Eurocrats in Brussels want to undermine NATO and rely more on an EU Army. The hilarious thing is they don't want to fund it properly, for example, Germany's armed forces reduced to a token force with most ships, aircraft, and submarines unsable due to repairs being required.
Wrong.It was the Greek politicians who took too much credit, lived lavishly, sent their population to retirement at 55 whereas the Germans changed retirement age from 63 to 67. There were lots of lies and corruption at play. I am not defending EU, I dont like it either. But a lot of the Greek problems were made by the Greek politicians, and the Greek people are paying the price.