Australian Govt Pledges Action On Google Tax Evasion

daria42 writes "Looks like Google's habit of funneling billions of dollars in revenue through its Irish and Bermuda subsidiaries continues to attract unfavorable government attention globally. France has already announced plans to take on the search giant's tax evasion habits, and the Australian Government, to which Google paid just $74,000 in tax last year despite having Australian revenues close to $1 billion, has now confirmed plans to do the same."

Comments

Re:It isn't very different

[Custard Horse]

Quite right.

Where there is an flaw in tax law, it will eventually be written out and that loophole closed. Google has avoided tax thus far but now is the time to pay up and for that to occur the law needs to be changed.

Of course, Google isn't the only entity using such tactics - it is the extent of the avoidance that is causing uproar. Every multinational company will have similar tax plans in place (or their accountants atrn't doing their jobs properly) and they will all be concerned about any tax developments.

Remember, it's not a Google Tax people want, it is a prevention of tax avoidance which might affect the decision of of large companies to move into or out of the countries where they have a physical presence. Catastrophic financial consequences may well occur.

Revision of tax law is not the work of a moment...

Re:It isn't very different

[drinkypoo]

Where there is an flaw in tax law, it will eventually be written out and that loophole closed

I can't speak for Australia, but here in the USA, corporate interests bought those laws, and therefore the features that permit them to dodge taxes are not flaws, they are the system working as designed. Therefore, they will not "eventually" be written out in order to close the loopholes, because the people writing the laws are keeping them open. Even if you should close a loophole, not only will another be opened, but the same one will be reopened later.

Every multinational company will have similar tax plans in place (or their accountants atrn't doing their jobs properly) and they will all be concerned about any tax developments.

I'm sure their lawyers are rubbing their "hands" (or pedipalps or whatever you call lawyers' forelimbs, I haven't kept up with analzoology) together with glee even as we type.

Revision of tax law is not the work of a moment...

No, it takes decades to really and truly corrupt a body of law.

I really don't know what things are like in Australia but since they learned most of what they know from the same teacher we did, only earlier, I imagine that law is pretty well and rightly fucked there as well.