Schmidt On Why Tax Avoidance is Good, Robot Workers, and Google Fiber 780
Bruce66423 writes "Eric Schmidt said that a £2.5 billion tax avoidance 'is called capitalism' and seems totally unrepentant. He added, 'I am very proud of the structure that we set up. We did it based on the incentives that the governments offered us to operate.' One must admit to being impressed by his honesty." Schmidt also says that if you want a job in the future you'll have to learn to "outrace the robots," and that Google Fiber is the most interesting project they have going.
Mobile Capital (Score:5, Informative)
Its not Capitalism, its "Mobile Capital"-ism. And governments need to adjust their tax structure very quickly! Otherwise national-level and smaller businesses will not be able to compete.
Re:Question (Score:5, Informative)
I do actually. As do most of the UK's population.
I live and work in the UK, and I take my pay through PAYE which means my income tax is automatically deducted. Most employees in the UK get paid this way.
I, and many others have the option of being paid outside the PAYE system so that we can manage our own taxes, this would allow us to take advantage of many tax evasions schemes available, or even simply do it ourselves by paying ourselves the minimum non-taxable wage and paying the rest out in a manner that doesn't attract things like national insurance.
Some people do do this, but most don't.
So can we now finally kill this stupid "How many people reading this intentionally pay more tax than they are strictly required to?" meme? Because certainly in the UK, the answer is "most people".
Re:Question (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Do No Evil (Score:4, Informative)
Evil is about morality, not legality. So yes, it can be evil when taken to the sort of extreme that Google and others have.
Re:Question (Score:2, Informative)
I do actually. As do most of the UK's population.
I live and work in the UK, and I take my pay through PAYE which means my income tax is automatically deducted. Most employees in the UK get paid this way.
I, and many others have the option of being paid outside the PAYE system so that we can manage our own taxes [...] by paying ourselves the minimum non-taxable wage and paying the rest out in a manner that doesn't attract things like national insurance.
You may want to look at the IR35 rules before trying that. Basically, if HMRC think you're an employee, you have to pay the usual employment taxes, regardless of the actual legal structure (true employee vs. self-employed vs. LTD etc.). The best you'll get by opting out of PAYE is moving from class 1 national insurance to class 4, which drops the effective tax rate by 3 points on the first ~40k in exchange for losing your entitlement to a state pension or job-seeker's allowance. For most people, that's not worth it.
(I'm not saying there aren't some other tricks you can use instead, but the old one of declaring yourself to be self-employed so that you can take your salary as dividends rather than income no longer works.)
(And, yes, I do pay extra tax because of IR35, and, yes, it is more than I'd pay as an employee, thanks for asking.)
Re:Question (Score:3, Informative)
is that no one goes out of their way to OVERPAY their taxes
I think Mitt Romney did for 2011.
Artificially Low Interest Rates lead to Automation (Score:4, Informative)
If interest rates (prices) were set on a free market with a hard currency it would be based on how much money people had saved (supply) and how much people wanted to borrow (demand). This works out nicely because any automation involves a large expenditure of money to increase productivity. If there is low unemployment and people have high wages and money saved it will lead to low interest rates. This causes businesses to want to invest in capital equipment because labor is expensive and money is cheap. On the other hand if you have high unemployment, low wages, and low savings you will have a high interest rate. This leads businesses to hire people because it's more profitable. This is a natural balance of sustainable automation.
What we have now is the Federal Reserve setting artificially low interest rates. This causes businesses to invest in automation at a time in which we have high unemployment, low wages, and low savings. This is exactly the wrong approach. It causes lots of malinvestment by automating production to increase capacity but nobody has enough money to buy these goods.
Re:Yeah. But what's "reasonably" angry?" (Score:5, Informative)
That's a really good explanation of what's going on, so thanks, but I disagree with your conclusion.
Most people don't do this as an individual because most people don't make enough money for it to be worthwhile. But let me explain why I don't have any ill-will at all towards these companies: it's a global economy, and countries have to compete for businesses. If they U.S. can't offer a competitive tax structure (I personally favor a corporate tax rate of zero*), then the companies move. It's the free market at it's best, and it happens even between states in the U.S., and I completely support it.
* - Where do companies get their money to pay taxes? Hint: it's not growing on the trees that are growing outside their offices. Studies indicate that an average of 21% of the cost of all the goods and services you buy in the U.S. are simply embedded taxes that get passed up the line to the government. Most businesses get their money from one source: their customers.