Facebook accused
of refusing to listen to ‘voice of public opinion’
Summary:
This
article is about Facebook avoiding tax in the UK by channelling it through
Ireland and they are using corporate structures to avoid tax. This scenario is just like the Starbucks one
which meant that they were not paying any corporation tax in the UK for the
last three years. The Treasury was unable to say whether the crackdown would
prevent Facebook from being able to avoid UK tax in the future.
Key points:
·
Facebook has been able to avoid paying any tax in the UK for the past
two years despite Britain being one of its biggest markets, with 33 million
people signing in at least once a month. Facebook’s UK accounts show the
company made a loss of £11.6m last year.
·
He said the levy, dubbed the “Google tax”, which will impose a 25% tax
on UK profits artificially shifted abroad, would raise more than £1bn over the
next five years.
·
The “Google tax” rate is 5% higher than next year’s UK corporation tax
rate of 20%, suggesting the chancellor hopes companies will choose to dismantle
complex structures that divert profits to low-tax nations such as Luxembourg
and Ireland, and choose to pay HM Revenue and Customs instead.
In
my opinion, this article shows how major media institutions have become so
complex and powerful and that they are crafty enough to find complex ways in
avoiding tax to carry on becoming richer.
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