Tax Haven Solution: Turn the Money into Confetti

a reply to: Flavian

Well now, if everyone in the country was being paid enough to live on, not just scrape survival on but actually LIVE on, and if there were enough jobs going to account for everyone who needed one, and if our government were not paying private organisations who store their money off shore, to perform tasks that should be carried out by persons employed directly by government...

PERHAPS I would have some sympathy with those who store their money off shore, but let's face it, the people who do that sort of thing are part of the problem, not its solution. The company which maintains and supplies the HMRC with all its goods and services store their money off shore, while overcharging the taxpayer for every single substandard biro pen, every packet of copier paper, every single airconditioning maintenance visit and so on and so forth. The government are contracted to use them, and no one else for this stuff, get robbed in the doing of it, and then the company store their money overseas. The taxpayer gets robbed twice, and barely an eye is batted.

I put a single blob of ink in the wrong box on a form, and you can bet your rear end that I will be in hot water up to my hippocampus, faster than you can say "blanched cranial matter". Something is awry here, and the reality is, this crap costs us way more than the benefits budget, or the cost of immigration, or the NHS, or even these things combined together.

Reply to jellyrev:

(From ipsedixit)
Few people remember that the last time America was great was the period after the war, up to the early 1960s, when the top tax rate was above 90%.

No, This quote needs to be killed with a stake. Rich people are smart and know what to do, see tax havens. All that 90% tax rate did was make rich people very clever. Businesses paid for all the rich people's expenses.

The interesting thing about the 90% tax rate is that it was sustained through a considerable period of prosperity and, I think, represents a more reasonable response by society in general to the many built in advantages that corporations and the rich enjoy, than a 35% tax rate.

Our elected representatives created tax havens for the oligarchs. As far as I'm concerned, their bodies should be exhumed and burned at the stake and tax havens and loopholes should be eliminated completely.

originally posted by: ipsedixit
Reply to jellyrev:

(From ipsedixit)
Few people remember that the last time America was great was the period after the war, up to the early 1960s, when the top tax rate was above 90%.

No, This quote needs to be killed with a stake. Rich people are smart and know what to do, see tax havens. All that 90% tax rate did was make rich people very clever. Businesses paid for all the rich people's expenses.

The interesting thing about the 90% tax rate is that it was sustained through a considerable period of prosperity and, I think, represents a more reasonable response by society in general to the many built in advantages that corporations and the rich enjoy, than a 35% tax rate.

Our elected representatives created tax havens for the oligarchs. As far as I'm concerned, their bodies should be exhumed and burned at the stake and tax havens and loopholes should be eliminated completely.

"The dishonesty or perhaps ignorance in the tax debate that is going on today is the complete misrepresentation of the pre-TRA86 [Tax Reform Act of 1986] higher marginal rates in the old ’53 code. Sure the marginal rates were insane, but the underlying tax code was rife with loopholes that a good tax planner (I was one) could exploit to get a person’s effective tax rate as low or lower then it is today. Those loopholes are no longer part of the tax code which is a good thing as they encouraged investors to invest in projects that had no economic viability other then the income sheltering effect they created.

What else is ignored in the conversation is the fact that there was a massive amount of tax fraud at all income levels under the old code. It was so bad and so common that most people took pride in telling others how they cheated on their taxes. When I was practicing it was quite common for us to pick up clients that had owned businesses that had grown into large enterprises that cheated extensively on their income taxes sometimes for decades. Usually the only reason this ever got exposed was due to the owners wanting to sell or go public.

Today it would be very hard to get away with significant tax fraud for very long and the current code does not offer very many ways to legally shelter income, so a marginal tax rate of 70% would probably produce an effective tax rate on the top 5% of at least 45-50% which would be more then double double what the effective rate was under the old tax code. Thus, if we were to go back to those insane marginal tax rates, we would be crossing into a level of taxation never seen in this country."

originally posted by: ipsedixit
a reply to: Flavian

One of the problems with the type of analysis at your linked article is that money in the economy has aspects of a "zero sum" game.

When one says that the rich are paying 50% of the taxes paid in the country, it begs the question, "Where did they get the money to pay that 50%?" Presumably they got that money from the general population in trade. So the general population paid those taxes through the rich.

That may sound glib, but it serves to introduce a lot of question marks around the movement of money in the economy. Are prices exorbitantly large? Is the labor force under pressure from the oligarchy to work for low wages?

It gets tricky. I think it would be very naive to believe the oligarchy, the wealthy business class or the old money when they cry, "Have pity on me. I'm a poor little overburdened rich boy."

Oh, i certainly agree in principle (ish). And it isn't all tax, just Income Tax. The top tax rate is 50% i think (may be 55%). So i also understand the argument that if you are already paying 50% tax, why not move a bit off shore?

However, you are correct (for me anyway) in that the disparity is so large, something should be done. It is unsustainable in the long run and history shows us that when such conditions appear, conflict is not too far away. Probably why they are all buying bunkers!

a reply to: TrueBrit

Oh i do agree. The reason though is the success of the British East India Company - no bear with me!!

The East India Company followed the earlier Ductch version after seeing how successful they were in the Pacific region. The huge profits they began to turn meant they had pretty much infinite resources (physical resources as well as cold hard cash), which eventually led to them getting pretty much unfettered power. For a long time, they were far wealthier than the British Government.

The result? Other nations and companies took note and began to replicate. Hundreds of years later, this is the result - nation states play second fiddle to corporate conglomerates.

a reply to: Flavian

That, like racial segregation in the US, Human Zoo exhibits, and "true stories" of adventures beyond the edge of the world (ridiculous poppycock) is rather old hat these days. There are many things that we have stopped doing as a society, because they are outmoded, and based in the most appalling wrong think.

I think it is time we stopped that practice of creating companies more powerful than governments. Everyone must be subject to the rule of law, equal subjects before it. Either everyone, or no one. I do not mind which.

a reply to: jellyrev

You appear to be quoting someone. Who is it?

The Netherlands wants you to believe that it is a tax haven.
I say instead that The Netherlands is a Communist/Socialist tax hellhole, in which the tax system serves exclusively the politburo that runs the country and the Kommissars from Brussels. This is the same thing that Italy has been doing since 1992. To see what will happen to The Netherlands in 10 years you just look at Italy right now.


Plans fro big Business ??? Stay out of taxation ... stay out of each and every EU country.