[governance] Re: Telecom TV on Google and Taxes

michael gurstein gurstein at gmail.com
Thu Dec 13 04:13:22 EST 2012 

I don`t think we are talking about ``voluntary`` tax... Rather we are talking about the lengths that corporations go to for tax avoidance/evasion... That I would guess is somewhat discretionary i.e. management decisions and not particularly transparent to shareholders.   

M

-----Original Message-----
From: apeake at gmail.com [mailto:apeake at gmail.com] On Behalf Of Adam Peake
Sent: Thursday, December 13, 2012 9:59 AM
To: governance at lists.igcaucus.org
Subject: Re: [governance] Re: Telecom TV on Google and Taxes

Anyone on the list own Google shares?

What would you do if Google paid a few billions of dollars in voluntary tax and the value of your shares dropped?

Adam





On Thu, Dec 13, 2012 at 5:50 PM, michael gurstein <gurstein at gmail.com> wrote:
> Adam,
>
>
>
> I`m curious why you think this… I would have thought that governments 
> are pretty much impervious to this kind of `lobbying` (jaded from 
> experience) while corporations that have as their slogan things like 
> `don`t be evil` might be extremely sensitive to this kind of public 
> comment on their behaviour by Civil Society.
>
>
>
> M
>
>
>
> From: apeake at gmail.com [mailto:apeake at gmail.com] On Behalf Of Adam 
> Peake
> Sent: Thursday, December 13, 2012 9:36 AM
> To: governance at lists.igcaucus.org
> Subject: Re: [governance] Re: Telecom TV on Google and Taxes
>
>
>
> -1
>
>
>
> write to politicians.  to google would be just posturing.
>
>
>
> Adam
>
>
>
>
>
> On Thu, Dec 13, 2012 at 1:40 PM, Salanieta T. Tamanikaiwaimaro 
> <salanieta.tamanikaiwaimaro at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>
>
> On Thu, Dec 13, 2012 at 5:33 PM, parminder <parminder at itforchange.net>
> wrote:
>
>
> Rather shameful that google paid 3 percent tax on its overseas 
> profit!! It surely leaves it with a lot of money to spend in lobbying 
> and advocacy efforts to keep global markets free for its unlettered 
> operations... Like organising campaigns against ITU, German legislature, and so on.
>
> Would IGC write an open letter to Google that its tax evasion policy 
> is anti people, and it should pays its taxes where it makes its 
> profit. (Or is it that the IG civil society does not go into such re-distributional questions
> )   It is not rhetorical but a real question to the list, and its
> coordinator.
>
>
>
> What does the list think?
>
> +1 if you think the IGC should write a letter to Google
>
> -1 if the IGC should not write a letter to Google
>
>
>
> As always the IGC decides
>
>
>  parminder
>
> On Wednesday 12 December 2012 09:37 PM, Salanieta T. Tamanikaiwaimaro wrote:
>
> More on Bloomberg:
> http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-12-10/google-revenues-sheltered-in-
> no-tax-bermuda-soar-to-10-billion.html
>
> On Thu, Dec 13, 2012 at 4:48 AM, Salanieta T. Tamanikaiwaimaro 
> <salanieta.tamanikaiwaimaro at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>
>
> Somehow it feels that there is a targeted media campaign out against 
> the likes of Google and other mncs - the timing of the release is 
> almost impeccable with the WCIT.
>
>
>
> Source:
> http://www.telecomtv.com/comspace_newsDetail.aspx?n=49763&id=e9381817-
> 0593-417a-8639-c4c53e2a2a10
>
>
>
> Google “can make money without doing evil” (as it evades $2bn in 
> taxes)
>
> Posted By TelecomTV One , 12 December 2012 | 1 Comments |    (0)
>
>
> Tags: Google corporate tax Finance
>
> As the net closes around the multinationals that avoid paying 
> corporation taxes, Google is accused of saving $2bn by routing income 
> through a “Double Irish Dutch Sandwich”, paying tax of just 3.2 per 
> cent on its overseas profits. Guy Daniels reports.
>
> Three questions. One; where do you stand on the subject of tax 
> avoidance? We at TelecomTV believe that individuals and corporations 
> have a duty to pay their fair share of tax. By fair, we mean whatever 
> respective governments rule to be the legal requirement (after all, in 
> most countries, we voted the politicians in to office). By all means 
> try and mitigate the amount of tax you have to pay, using whatever 
> accepted mechanisms are available. But avoidance? That just means 
> somebody else (with far less access to expensive and clever advisors) has to contribute to your share as well.
>
>
>
> Second question: how do you define evil? The Oxford English Dictionary 
> defines evil as “profoundly immoral and wicked” or “something which is 
> harmful or undesirable”. In my book, that means tax avoidance is evil, 
> simple as that.
>
>
>
> Third and final question: Is Google evil? If you believe that avoiding 
> tax is wrong (especially through aggressive and mind-boggling 
> complicated avoidance schemes) and if you believe that depriving 
> society of tax revenues is wrong (and so reducing the level of 
> available State support for the most
> needy) and could be described as an evil act, then surely you must 
> conclude that Google is acting in an evil manner.
>
>
>
> An investigative report by Bloomberg has discovered that Google 
> avoided about $2 billion in worldwide income taxes in 2011 by shifting 
> $9.8 billion in revenues into a Bermuda shell company – almost double 
> its total from three years ago. The information was disclosed in a 
> November filing by a Google subsidiary in the Netherlands, which was 
> discovered by reporters from Bloomberg.
>
>
>
> It appears that Google legally routed profits from overseas 
> subsidiaries into Bermuda, which doesn’t have a corporate income tax, 
> thereby enabling it to cut its overall tax rate almost in half. 
> Bloomberg says the amount moved to Bermuda is equivalent to about 80 
> per cent of Google’s total pretax profit in 2011.
>
>
>
> Tax evasion and avoidance costs the European Union a staggering €1 
> trillion a year. That’s worth dwelling on for a moment longer…. €1 
> trillion. No wonder politicians are now acting to try and prevent this 
> financial loss and branding such acts as scandalous and immoral.
>
>
>
> Bloomberg has a good quote from a UK-based tax accountant, which 
> pretty much sums up the feeling in Europe at the moment. According to 
> Richard Murphy of Tax Research:
>
>
>
> “The tax strategy of Google and other multinationals is a deep 
> embarrassment to governments around Europe. The political awareness 
> now being created in the UK, and to a lesser degree elsewhere in Europe, is: It’s us or them.
> People understand that if Google doesn’t pay, somebody else has to pay 
> or services get cut.”
>
>
>
> Just look what happened to Starbucks. When the public discovered the 
> US coffee giant paid zero taxes in the UK (yes, absolutely nothing at 
> all), it started to boycott the chain.
>
> Advertisement
>
> As a result, Starbucks was forced to “volunteer” to pay taxes…
>
>
>
> The UK is Google’s second-biggest market, responsible for about 11 per 
> cent of its sales. Of the $4 billion it turned over last year, it paid 
> UK corporation tax of less than $10 million. Bloomberg says Google 
> avoids tax by using an Irish subsidiary to collects revenues from ads 
> sold in the UK, which then pays royalties to another Irish subsidiary 
> whose legal residence is in Bermuda. Payments are then sent to yet 
> another subsidiary in the Netherlands (with no employees, note) before 
> finally reaching the tax haven of Bermuda.
>
>
>
> Sounds pretty ‘evil’ to me. And if so, then that’s against the 
> internet company’s guiding principles. Stated clearly on the “Ten 
> Things We Know to be True” page on Google’s website is the following:
>
>
>
> “You can make money without doing evil.”
>
>
>
> I’m sorry, Google, but I don’t see how avoiding tax is anything but 
> evil. Of course you – and all companies – have a duty to shareholders 
> to maximise profits. But there are rules. Some of these are merely 
> ethical, whilst some are legal. There is no indication or suggestion 
> that Google has acted illegally, but there is every suggestion that it has acted unethically.
>
>
>
> And who said you can’t have ‘ethical companies’? Of course you can. I 
> don’t buy the ‘extreme capitalist’ viewpoint that corporations will 
> only act in self-interest and never “do the right thing” or pay their 
> fair share. If their customers start to boycott their services, then 
> they’ll change. It happened with the sudden emergence of all the 
> so-called ‘corporate responsibility’ positions that all featured 
> heavily in annual reports. I don’t see why it can’t happen with fair tax positions.
>
>
>
> Other ICT companies reported in the media to be using this complicated 
> tax evasion (sorry lawyers, of course I mean ‘mitigation’…) structure 
> include Apple, Facebook, Microsoft and Oracle. Unfortunately, Google – 
> and all the others, who no doubt will soon be named and shamed – will 
> continue their sharp practices until they are forced to make a change. 
> If governments can’t do that through the legal process, then it’s up 
> to customers to vote with their feet and walk away from Google 
> services. As Richard Murphy said, consumers are beginning to get the 
> message that it’s “us or them”, and we’re already being squeezed by 
> the many austerity measures that are in effect to drag us out of recession.
>
>
>
> Come on Google, time to step up to the plate and show some leadership. 
> Pay your fair share. And then the rest of the ICT industry can do 
> likewise. Or else remove that fatuous and out-dated “don’t do evil” 
> slogan from your website once and for all.
>
>
>
> Further reading: The Pearse Trust blog has a detailed explanation of 
> the so-called “Double Irish Dutch Sandwich” tax scheme. Please don’t 
> try and implement it.
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> --
>
> Salanieta Tamanikaiwaimaro aka Sala
>
> P.O. Box 17862
>
> Suva
>
> Fiji
>
>
>
> Twitter: @SalanietaT
>
> Skype:Salanieta.Tamanikaiwaimaro
>
> Tel: +679 3544828
>
> Fiji Cell: +679 998 2851
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> ____________________________________________________________
> You received this message as a subscriber on the list:
>      governance at lists.igcaucus.org
> To be removed from the list, visit:
>      http://www.igcaucus.org/unsubscribing
>
> For all other list information and functions, see:
>      http://lists.igcaucus.org/info/governance
> To edit your profile and to find the IGC's charter, see:
>      http://www.igcaucus.org/
>
> Translate this email: http://translate.google.com/translate_t
>
>
>
>
>
> --
>
> Salanieta Tamanikaiwaimaro aka Sala
>
> P.O. Box 17862
>
> Suva
>
> Fiji
>
>
>
> Twitter: @SalanietaT
>
> Skype:Salanieta.Tamanikaiwaimaro
>
> Tel: +679 3544828
>
> Fiji Cell: +679 998 2851
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> ____________________________________________________________
> You received this message as a subscriber on the list:
>      governance at lists.igcaucus.org
> To be removed from the list, visit:
>      http://www.igcaucus.org/unsubscribing
>
> For all other list information and functions, see:
>      http://lists.igcaucus.org/info/governance
> To edit your profile and to find the IGC's charter, see:
>      http://www.igcaucus.org/
>
> Translate this email: http://translate.google.com/translate_t
>
>



-------------- next part --------------
____________________________________________________________
You received this message as a subscriber on the list:
     governance at lists.igcaucus.org
To be removed from the list, visit:
     http://www.igcaucus.org/unsubscribing

For all other list information and functions, see:
     http://lists.igcaucus.org/info/governance
To edit your profile and to find the IGC's charter, see:
     http://www.igcaucus.org/

Translate this email: http://translate.google.com/translate_t

More information about the Governance mailing list