Re: Greece - Rise of the left or rise of the young? : Thu Jan 29, 2015 6:12 pm  

cod'ead wrote:

No, the major problem with the Greek economy is the systemic corruption at the top of society and the reluctance of the oligarchs to contribute to their own society through taxation.

Not too dissimilar to our own problems really

Agree with your last point certainly no trickle down here - the skill is to get a more even spread of wealth without killing the goose that lays the golden egg i.e. Capitalism.

Re: Greece - Rise of the left or rise of the young? : Thu Jan 29, 2015 9:14 pm  

Sal Paradise wrote:

Agree with your last point certainly no trickle down here - the skill is to get a more even spread of wealth without killing the goose that lays the golden egg i.e. Capitalism.

Only if the capitalism is responsible.

That means no Double Irish, or other transfer pricing mechanisms to offshore tax liabilities to cheaper jurisdictions. When capitalists can be shown to be responsible and not systemically duplicitous, then I'll revisit your argument

Re: Greece - Rise of the left or rise of the young? : Thu Jan 29, 2015 9:19 pm  

DHM wrote:

Whatever Greece was doing wasn't working. You get the feeling that the newly elected leadership are genuinely going to try something else. It's an interesting concept, elect a government that will actually do something different, not effectively claim it can do exactly the same as the last one but just a bit better.

If I were an ordinary Greek I would tell the Germans to go **** themselves. They only bankrolled the Greek bailout to protect their f*****g stupid Euro anyway. A single currency with the same value across vastly different economies is frankly rediculous. It's right the Germans should pump money into Greece, if you want a single currency then you should have a single economy- and that means they all stand or fall together.

Should be interesting.

Don't rule out a silver bullet: Tsipras is the first Greek PM to have NO connections to old Greek money. I hope he's got a kevlar wardrobe

Re: Greece - Rise of the left or rise of the young? : Fri Jan 30, 2015 8:11 am  

cod'ead wrote:

Don't rule out a silver bullet: Tsipras is the first Greek PM to have NO connections to old Greek money. I hope he's got a kevlar wardrobe

Plane crash. Unknown mechanical failure.

When you absolutely, positively need to rub out pesky nationalist politicians opposed to god-fearing Free Market Capitalism - accept no substitutes.

Re: Greece - Rise of the left or rise of the young? : Fri Jan 30, 2015 12:46 pm  

cod'ead wrote:

Only if the capitalism is responsible.

That means no Double Irish, or other transfer pricing mechanisms to offshore tax liabilities to cheaper jurisdictions. When capitalists can be shown to be responsible and not systemically duplicitous, then I'll revisit your argument

The vast majority of capitalists are responsible you have a minority who abuse the system. Bankers are a very isolated group of greedy arrogant people whose behaviour needs to be controlled. Unfortunately they are in a fortunate position where very few banks can be let go to the wall, they have it all ways and they know it.

The point of any business is to deliver returns to shareholder/s - where you have differing tax regimes around the world you will encourage a culture of shifting profits to where it can be taxed the least. If it were my business I would do the same and I suggest so would most people given the opportunity.

What is the alternative, no other system has been proved to deliver the overall benefits of Capitalism - yes it has its abuses but so does every other economic system out there but it delivers far greater benefits than any of it rivals

Re: Greece - Rise of the left or rise of the young? : Fri Jan 30, 2015 1:52 pm  

Sal Paradise wrote:

The vast majority of capitalists are responsible you have a minority who abuse the system. Bankers are a very isolated group of greedy arrogant people whose behaviour needs to be controlled. Unfortunately they are in a fortunate position where very few banks can be let go to the wall, they have it all ways and they know it.

The point of any business is to deliver returns to shareholder/s - where you have differing tax regimes around the world you will encourage a culture of shifting profits to where it can be taxed the least. If it were my business I would do the same and I suggest so would most people given the opportunity.

What is the alternative, no other system has been proved to deliver the overall benefits of Capitalism - yes it has its abuses but so does every other economic system out there but it delivers far greater benefits than any of it rivals

Are you saying that you're comfortable with a multi-national making profits from selling products or services in the UK, using a UK workforce to deliver those services or products and then booking profit to Luxembourg to take advantage of a 1% CT rate?

Transparent, country by country reporting is required and a commitment to pay tax on profits in the country those profits were earned.

A recent example of what can happen when a company's primary focus is on delivering shareholder returns is Tesco: systematically screwing suppliers and employees, offshoring profit and creative accounting principles - all to seemingly keep "the City" happy.

Now that didn't turn out to well did it?

Re: Greece - Rise of the left or rise of the young? : Fri Jan 30, 2015 3:28 pm  

cod'ead wrote:

Are you saying that you're comfortable with a multi-national making profits from selling products or services in the UK, using a UK workforce to deliver those services or products and then booking profit to Luxembourg to take advantage of a 1% CT rate?

Transparent, country by country reporting is required and a commitment to pay tax on profits in the country those profits were earned.

A recent example of what can happen when a company's primary focus is on delivering shareholder returns is Tesco: systematically screwing suppliers and employees, offshoring profit and creative accounting principles - all to seemingly keep "the City" happy.

Now that didn't turn out to well did it?

Am I comfortable not really but I understand why its done and until you change the rules then what can you expect. Would you rather that than they take all their business elsewhere and do nothing in the UK?

Agree with your second point and strict IFRS rules about transfer pricing and apportionment of HO costs

Tesco is having a hard time now - it will recover, this has been a good business that has paid huge amounts of CT in the UK. On suppliers nobody forces them to sell to Tesco. Perhaps if all the milk producers got together and set up a co-op then perhaps they would be better off - Tesco et al have to have milk. Most consumers have sympathy for the them I wouldn't mind paying extra as long as the producers got it. Problem is somebody would break the agreement.

Re: Greece - Rise of the left or rise of the young? : Fri Jan 30, 2015 4:42 pm  

Capitalism = Greed.
Capitalism = Something for nothing.
Capitalism can only survive with inflation and be a constant increasing upward spiral with increasing prices.
Capitalism can only work with "credit" i.e imaginary finance that just dosn't exist except as a concept/idea
Capitalism can never be "efficient" to lower costs and improve employees living standards, the desire is to increase profits for the few .
Shareholders are just like the people who go into the bookies. They take a gamble, but have rigged the rules in such a way that their losses, if any, are minimised.
Shareholders sit at home all day watching 40" plasma TV's or out playing and drinking, being subsidised by those who actually do the work.
Shareholders are like people on benefits, wanting something for nothing.
If businesses are making "excessive" profits, then either their prices are too high or they they are not paying the people who create the products enough.
At best it's a crazy system, but it "works" because the "educational system" ensures it works.
Like most, I can live and work within the current system, but that is not to say I condone the current system and cannot say it isn't in the best interest of human beings on the only planet we can all live on.
It's simply greed is the biggest motivator on the planet.
Caring about your fellow human beings? Nah that's some elses job.
We live in interesting times.

Re: Greece - Rise of the left or rise of the young? : Fri Jan 30, 2015 4:53 pm  

cod'ead wrote:

Transparent, country by country reporting is required and a commitment to pay tax on profits in the country those profits were earned.
...

Maybe, but I really don't see why HMRC don't just look at the profits in the accounts, and land them with a whopping great tax bill, on the basis if they want to enter into artificial schemes involving associated companies based in an attic in Luxembourg then that's fine, but does not affect their tax. They would have to pay that tax, and if they wanted to appeal through the courts and persuade a judge that it really was all genuine, and not at all an associated companies scam for no purpose other than to save tax, well, crack on, and good luck with that.

Re: Greece - Rise of the left or rise of the young? : Fri Jan 30, 2015 5:13 pm  

Ferocious Aardvark wrote:

Maybe, but I really don't see why HMRC don't just look at the profits in the accounts, and land them with a whopping great tax bill, on the basis if they want to enter into artificial schemes involving associated companies based in an attic in Luxembourg then that's fine, but does not affect their tax. They would have to pay that tax, and if they wanted to appeal through the courts and persuade a judge that it really was all genuine, and not at all an associated companies scam for no purpose other than to save tax, well, crack on, and good luck with that.

"...and the screams of torment at the next shareholders meeting could be heard from every vantage point in the land, and those screaming the loudest were the very ones who had once thought that their job in parliament would lead to riches untold when they took the pension out."