- Joined
- 30 Jul 2006
- Posts
- 12,130
In 1929
As you say, "In a world of your own". Feel free to stick your snout above ground and join the rest of us in the 21st century some time.
Chief Secretary to the Treasury says tax avoidance is wrong . . . sometimes . . .
- Thread starter stockhausen
- Start date
As you say, "In a world of your own". Feel free to stick your snout above ground and join the rest of us in the 21st century some time.
Soldato
- Joined
- 29 Sep 2011
- Posts
- 6,231
- Location
- melee island
I like the way stockhausen refuses to bite back that nastily at some of the abuse and borderline personal attacks he recieves on this family friendly forum 
I think the question is "Is all tax avoidence okay, totally fine because its law?" and "Is some tax avoidence actually really bad and being made a mockery of at the taxpayers expense".
I think the question is "Is all tax avoidence okay, totally fine because its law?" and "Is some tax avoidence actually really bad and being made a mockery of at the taxpayers expense".
In 1929
As you say, "In a world of your own". Feel free to stick your snout above ground and join the rest of us in the 21st century some time.
Seems just as reasonable a quote now as then tbh.
Soldato
- Joined
- 2 Apr 2009
- Posts
- 5,917
- Location
- Location, Location!
In 1929
As you say, "In a world of your own". Feel free to stick your snout above ground and join the rest of us in the 21st century some time.
I work in tax for a living and it is quite apparent that your views are completely nonsensical. I don't think you grasp the tax system or the job of a tax advisor.
Roflcoptors!!!!
If all tax avoidance is ok, why have the current government said
We are not talking about people using legislation in the way it is intended to reduce their liability, eg: putting money into your ISA
You should be able to see that something may be strictly legal, but not morally right as it is not within the spirit of the law.
Turn this around, you generally scream and shout about all these 'benefit scroungers' who live on benefits and don't work, or get £2M London houses for their 10 kids paid by housing benefit...well, they aren't doing anything legally wrong, but you feel it is morally wrong don't you.
We are not talking about people using legislation in the way it is intended to reduce their liability, eg: putting money into your ISA
You should be able to see that something may be strictly legal, but not morally right as it is not within the spirit of the law.
Turn this around, you generally scream and shout about all these 'benefit scroungers' who live on benefits and don't work, or get £2M London houses for their 10 kids paid by housing benefit...well, they aren't doing anything legally wrong, but you feel it is morally wrong don't you.
Indeed, so parliament need to somehow change the tax system if they feel it isn't being used to their benefit, I fully agree with your sentiments concerning immorality, a large portion of the big earners are immoral though, that's how they made their money in the first place, we are far from living in a fair society however the government do have the ability to change it, they just wont.
Soldato
- Joined
- 29 Sep 2011
- Posts
- 6,231
- Location
- melee island
Well said MrFreak.
Massive Who-har about saving a paltry 275 million. An excellent distraction from the likes of millionaire front benchers and billionare companies abusing the tax system for mahoosive ammounts that makes 275 million seem like pocket money.
You are of course right, however if laws are poorly written to start with (and they often are) then it's parliaments fault if people take advantage and it's down to parliament to both correct the original mistake AND make sure they do a darn sight better job of writing laws in the future!
Agreed, but since the people doing the large scale corporate avoidance are generally the friends/donors/business colleagues of the people making the laws... Can you see a possible causative effect of why the laws aren't tightened up?
And again, you seem to be justifying the action because it can openly bypass the intent of the law without breaking it. Is that right even though not illegal?
I know since its not illegal we can't 'do' anything about it, it just astounds me the amount of people who think this is perfectly acceptable behaviour to do, but then get morally outraged and call everyone scum who claim tax back in benefits.
Last edited:
Why is it not morally right? You seem to be suggesting that just because something is not done in the spirit of the law then it is morally wrong. Whilst the law and morals do intersect on occassions they are not necessarily the same thing.
So, legality aside, explain to me what is immoral about arranging your affairs in such a way as to reduce your overall tax bill? Bearing in mind that some of the cases being banded about (i.e. the UKUncut favourite Vodaphone) it is somewhat more complex than "They are dodging tax".
The government always has the right to change the law if it feels there are issues with it. Indeed, the best thing they could do to combat tax avoidance is dramatic simplification of the tax code.
However, there is still nothing wrong with minimising the ability of the government to steal your assets...
In some cases I do feel companies are bordering the line between 'clever business management' and 'debatably dubious'.
For example, isn't Amazon UK entirely based in Luxemburg to avoid being taxed in this country? That seems a bit dubious to me because practically speaking it encourages a race to the bottom in terms of tax and regulation. From Amazon's perspective it's clever, but I'm not sure to the extents they should be allowed to do it.
This is all based off small things I have read rather than a detailed knowledge, of course.
Given the alternative to a race to the bottom is enforced uncompetitiveness among those who agree to harmonise while the race to the bottom continues elsewhere, I have to disagree.
This is one of the reasons Europe has suffered compared to other economies and is struggling.
Yeah, Greece is really in the **** because they pay too much tax there.
Greece is in the **** because of irresponsible left wing spending policies exceeding the tax take with spending....
Why is your idea of a solution never to stop spending money that isn't available, and instead to work harder to steal money from people who have earnt it?
It's difficult to know how to deal with it. Countries such as ours probably couldn't cope with taxing businesses less, but you can go swings and roundabouts and claim the government shouldn't be spending so much money anyway.
From my academic experiences with financial services regulation a race to the bottom is generally seen as a very bad thing, but I appreciate that is somewhat different to rates of taxation.
- Joined
- 30 Jul 2006
- Posts
- 12,130
I can only imagine that you failed to read my opening post. To save you time and inconvenience, it is repeated below:
I did not at any point suggest that what was being done by the rich was illegal (although that may on occasion be the case (e.g. Vodafone & Goldman Sachs)).Of course, tax dodging is absolutely fine if you happen to be a major donor to the Tory partyBBC online said:
-or-
an ex-Prime Minister
-or-
a newspaper proprietor
-or-
Vodafone
-or-
Goldman Sachs
-or-
Boots
-or- RBS, Barclays, HSBC, Lloyds, Tesco, etc., etc., etc.
or in fact, anyone at all in the private sector
When are politicians going to accept that tax dodging is simply unacceptable?
I wondered whether and when the ConDems were actually going to do something to stop immoral and unethical practice of tax dodging. They seem very keen to curtail the significantly less pernicious and expensive practice of benefit cheating and scrounging (the latter is of course entirely legal).
What a laughable analysis.
I agree, not in all cases no, but I do believe so in this example....and at the end of the day the basis of law has arisen from morality.
Because even as the Government have described it, tax avoidance measures are given within the system to help and incentivise people/companies for all manner of reasons. These are supposed to be used within the normal scope of the business. But when systems are set up with no relevance to the running of the business, solely for tax avoidance then I do believe this is wrong. Maybe I shouldn't be an accountant eh?
I know liberals complain about the left policies of progressive taxation - why should you pay more tax when you earn more, it should be a flat rate tax (Not that I personally agree with this) but even so, can anyone explain why it is ok that when you hit the status of 'super-rich' you should pay less tax (as a %) than the lower earners?
Especially in todays climate, where its well known the country is broke, Don't you think we should all just man up and pay our fair share?
Last edited:
That doesn't really answer the question, though to be fair you aren't actually one of the people saying it is immoral.
Why is reducing the amount of tax you pay immoral? Especially when a lot of the companies mentioned are still contributing significant amounts of money to the UK tax coffers.