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ORIGINAL: Musicmystery

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ORIGINAL: tj444

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ORIGINAL: Musicmystery

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ORIGINAL: tj444

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ORIGINAL: Musicmystery

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ORIGINAL: tj444

So Burger King is doing a tax inversion to escape high US taxes.. its buying Tim Hortons.. and moving to the "tax haven" known as.. umm.. Canada.. whodathunkit????

My comment is tongue n cheek as I never considered Canada to be a low tax country..

That's because you keep electing a conservative prime minister.

Dude.. a Canadian Conservative Prime Minister is the equivalent of a US Liberal/Democrat President.. our "conservative" isn't like your "conservative".. since Canada is considered by ya'll as one of them there "socialist" countries..

Oh...dudette....I didn't realize Canadian corporate taxes fell all by themselves.

WTF does the Prime Minister being a "conservative" have to do with anything? All countries can change their tax laws when they decide its beneficial to their country to do so (just as the US can).. just as Puerto Rico did recently in giving corporations and people major tax breaks to 2030 for moving and living there.. those tax breaks in PR are the best in the world and the only escape from the IRS that Americans can ever get (short of giving up their US citizenship)..

Perhaps you're unaware that various political factions have stated agendas.

Or that the tax structure of Canada is changing rapidly.

The federal corporate tax rate has been nearly cut in half since 2000 -- from 28 per cent at the turn of the century to 15 per cent in 2012. The Harper government boasts that this will give Canadian corporations the lowest tax rate on new investment of any G7 country.

For the first time in Canadian history, more than half of the federal government’s revenue in 2014 will come from personal income taxes -- a vivid sign that Canada’s tax burden is slowly shifting away from corporations and onto consumers.

Canadians’ personal income taxes will account for more than half of government revenue next year. That’s up from only 30 per cent five decades ago.

“Tax rates on top incomes and corporations have been cut, while the use of tax loopholes and tax havens have proliferated,” writes Sanger, who works as senior economist for the Canadian Union of Public Employees.

Sanger notes that taxes in Canada have been shrinking: The federal government's overall take this year will amount to 14 per cent of the economy, the lowest since 1940. But Sanger is concerned about who is paying Canada's lower taxes.

“Despite record profits, corporations provide just 13.6 per cent of the federal government’s revenues in corporate income taxes. That’s a third less than the over 20 per cent share they provided during the ‘Golden Age of Capitalism’ from 1946 to 1970.”

Others argue that even as corporations have enjoyed a far more favourable environment in Canada, consumers are getting hit with all sort of “hidden taxes.”

Former Liberal cabinet minister Ralph Goodale recently wrote in HuffPost that the Harper government has "increased the net tax burden on Canadians in each of their last four budgets."

http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/2013/11/24/corporate-personal-taxes-canada_n_4333694.html

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ORIGINAL: cloudboy
Professor Kleinbard contends that most United States multinational companies don’t pay anywhere near 35 percent. Companies paid, on average, 12.6 percent, according to the Government Accountability Office, which last measured it in 2010, by deliberately stashing piles of cash abroad.

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ORIGINAL: tj444

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ORIGINAL: Musicmystery

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ORIGINAL: tj444

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ORIGINAL: Musicmystery

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ORIGINAL: tj444

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ORIGINAL: Musicmystery

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ORIGINAL: tj444

So Burger King is doing a tax inversion to escape high US taxes.. its buying Tim Hortons.. and moving to the "tax haven" known as.. umm.. Canada.. whodathunkit????

My comment is tongue n cheek as I never considered Canada to be a low tax country..

That's because you keep electing a conservative prime minister.

Dude.. a Canadian Conservative Prime Minister is the equivalent of a US Liberal/Democrat President.. our "conservative" isn't like your "conservative".. since Canada is considered by ya'll as one of them there "socialist" countries..

Oh...dudette....I didn't realize Canadian corporate taxes fell all by themselves.

WTF does the Prime Minister being a "conservative" have to do with anything? All countries can change their tax laws when they decide its beneficial to their country to do so (just as the US can).. just as Puerto Rico did recently in giving corporations and people major tax breaks to 2030 for moving and living there.. those tax breaks in PR are the best in the world and the only escape from the IRS that Americans can ever get (short of giving up their US citizenship)..

Perhaps you're unaware that various political factions have stated agendas.

Or that the tax structure of Canada is changing rapidly.

The federal corporate tax rate has been nearly cut in half since 2000 -- from 28 per cent at the turn of the century to 15 per cent in 2012. The Harper government boasts that this will give Canadian corporations the lowest tax rate on new investment of any G7 country.

For the first time in Canadian history, more than half of the federal government’s revenue in 2014 will come from personal income taxes -- a vivid sign that Canada’s tax burden is slowly shifting away from corporations and onto consumers.

Canadians’ personal income taxes will account for more than half of government revenue next year. That’s up from only 30 per cent five decades ago.

“Tax rates on top incomes and corporations have been cut, while the use of tax loopholes and tax havens have proliferated,” writes Sanger, who works as senior economist for the Canadian Union of Public Employees.

Sanger notes that taxes in Canada have been shrinking: The federal government's overall take this year will amount to 14 per cent of the economy, the lowest since 1940. But Sanger is concerned about who is paying Canada's lower taxes.

“Despite record profits, corporations provide just 13.6 per cent of the federal government’s revenues in corporate income taxes. That’s a third less than the over 20 per cent share they provided during the ‘Golden Age of Capitalism’ from 1946 to 1970.”

Others argue that even as corporations have enjoyed a far more favourable environment in Canada, consumers are getting hit with all sort of “hidden taxes.”

Former Liberal cabinet minister Ralph Goodale recently wrote in HuffPost that the Harper government has "increased the net tax burden on Canadians in each of their last four budgets."

http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/2013/11/24/corporate-personal-taxes-canada_n_4333694.html

perhaps you are unaware of the various big corps that negotiate secret back-room deals with the IRS (Advance Pricing Agreements) which is the equivalent of inversion without having to buy some company in some other country.. that's why Google, Apple, etc etc etc pay so little in tax.. maybe Americans should clean up their own backyard.. who the f do you think makes up for those big rich corps paying squat in taxes? its you that pays their share..

As far as the Canadian govt reducing corporate taxes, it can slowly go up again too.. corps that move their operations to Canada take the risk that the tax play is short term.. But in the interim, maybe the lower taxes are why the Canadian economy has done fairly well while the US has been swirling around for years in a painful and pathetic economic quagmire..

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ORIGINAL: tj444

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ORIGINAL: Zonie63

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ORIGINAL: freedomdwarf1

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ORIGINAL: mnottertail

The firm has offices in NYC and Rio De Janiro.

50% foreign, 50% tax raise from maximum US tax rate.

BK have something like 11 million outlets.
I'd hazard a guess that they've got offices in just about every country they operate in just like McD's and coca-cola have.

That said, I believe there's a collective move (certainly by the Europeans) to close those sort of tax loopholes so that multi-national corporations pay their fair share of taxes no matter where they try and hide the profits.
Google, Amazon, all the big fast-food chains etc are facing some tough tax legislation over here.
Maybe the rest of the 1st-world nations should follow up??

Though to be honest, as you rightly pointed out, whatever we tax them at they'll only pass that cost down to the consumer.

Yes, but if we increase taxes on them to the point where it costs consumers $20 for a Whopper, then Burger King will eventually go out of business, and they'll learn a harsh lesson about what happens to those who "invert." The idea should be to set it up so that businesses will lose far more than whatever they might have gained in lower taxes.

I don't think so, actually.. more laws etc simply breeds more loopholes or ways around the laws.. not to mention, does anyone seriously think that the politicians will do squat about inversion?

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and inversion is only one segment of the puzzle, what about those sneaky, back-room deals the IRS does which cuts the big corps tax in half? those are only for the big, rich corps and totally unfair to the rest of businesses that pay their full chunk..

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ORIGINAL: Musicmystery

This is not a competition (at least not for me). Reality is, though, that the Canadian dollar, largely on a par with the US dollar a few years ago, is worth 92 cents. My assistant lives in Nova Scotia, and I'm saving a fortune, as I pay her in Canadian dollars.

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ORIGINAL: Zonie63

Not the current crop of politicians, no. But the politicians can be changed, just as the laws and loopholes can be changed.

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ORIGINAL: tj444

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ORIGINAL: Musicmystery

This is not a competition (at least not for me). Reality is, though, that the Canadian dollar, largely on a par with the US dollar a few years ago, is worth 92 cents. My assistant lives in Nova Scotia, and I'm saving a fortune, as I pay her in Canadian dollars.

Thank you for outsourcing to Canada & stimulating the Canadian economy!!!

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ORIGINAL: Musicmystery

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ORIGINAL: tj444

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ORIGINAL: Musicmystery

This is not a competition (at least not for me). Reality is, though, that the Canadian dollar, largely on a par with the US dollar a few years ago, is worth 92 cents. My assistant lives in Nova Scotia, and I'm saving a fortune, as I pay her in Canadian dollars.

Thank you for outsourcing to Canada & stimulating the Canadian economy!!!

My pleasure. I also avoid payroll taxes that way. It comes back, though -- a third of my clients are Canadian.

I outsource to Brazil too, and have clients in India, the UK, Australia, and St. Martin's as well as US clients.

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ORIGINAL: Musicmystery

I like it here. It's nice.

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ORIGINAL: Musicmystery

You are confusing moving along a demand curve, it's slope, and a shift in demand.

You're going to parse this endlessly, clearly. Here's the bottom line -- you made a sweeping statement originally that isn't necessarily true, and it's not true for solid economic reasons. Again (y'all keep ignoring this point), if businesses could simply raise prices without losing sales, they would, rather than waiting for cost increases to pass along, because they sell goods not where the price is highest, but where net profit is highest. Depending on elasticity, a cost increase might alter that calculus, but it's certainly not as simple and automatic as passing on the entire cost, because except at one end of the continuum, that would not maximize profit.

That change could also spark a change in quantity supplied, depending on the elasticity of supply, a further calculation.

So you've done some quick Internet searches, but you're still trying to cram the new information into your old assumption -- and that assumption isn't true, and for good reason.

Everything else (and probably what will continue to follow) is just circles and anecdotes.

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ORIGINAL: Musicmystery

tj, that actually speaks to the other preferences too.

I don't have an assistant in Canada to avoid the payroll taxes -- that's a side benefit. She's my assistant because she's the best at what she does and at what I need done. It's a good fit.

I actually use Brazil a lot less than I used to -- not because the finances changed, but because my business needs changed, and while they're still the best at what they do, I need less of it now, and what I need is in the US. It's about a good fit.

And large businesses are not essentially different. Yes, financial decisions enter the picture, but what they need and what can best address that is generally a far more important question than where's the absolute bottom price for one.

In Burger King's case, they can merge corporate headquarters -- a ton of overhead. And Tim Horton's has had a very hard time breaking into US markets in any substantial way -- BK can help them do that. It's synergistic.

It comes with tax benefits too. But I'd be surprised if that were the primary reason.

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This process, called inversion, has been occurring more and more often, despite the fascistic suggestion by President Obama that headquartering outside the United States represents a betrayal of God and country. Members of the Obama administration have taken to labeling business inversions a lack of “economic patriotism” – presumably under the assumption that to stay in America, cut jobs, and lose all profits in order to pay higher taxes represents a sort of higher moral value than moving one’s headquarters and continuing to pay millions of workers and reward consumers with better and cheaper products.

The Obama administration ought to note that the Soviets built a wall in the center of Berlin to keep their people and industries “economically patriotic.”

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ORIGINAL: tj444

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ORIGINAL: Zonie63

Not the current crop of politicians, no. But the politicians can be changed, just as the laws and loopholes can be changed.

A big problem with US politics is it has become a millionaire's game.. you really do need big bucks in the bank (a 1%er) and even bigger bucks backing you to be a US politician today.. that means tomorrows crop of them will be the same as todays crop of them.. the face may change but...

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ORIGINAL: mnottertail

Absolutely it is a betrayal. Its what you get with de-regulation. Jail the fuckers, throw them to the nutsackers.

Abolish corporate enabling laws. Make them illegal.