> It's a problem when small companies have to pay company tax, and large multinational companies do not, merely because the latter has the legal know-how and the funds to achieve it.
Hence the question of why are countries not changing the rules so the large multinational companies cannot achieve it.
> As an analogy, it'd be like a road worker paying 30 percent tax on a $100k income and a company CEO paying 0-5 percent tax on a $10m income.
This seems unrelated to my question, but is there anywhere that this is true? All the examples of this I am familiar with in the US involve ignoring the fact that the CEO is not getting $10m of cash income, otherwise they would be paying a lot more tax than someone with $100k cash income. Which is stupid and invalidates any point trying to be made.
If the argument is that society needs to start collecting tax on wealth and forcing sales of assets, then so be it, but it should be stated as such.
"Hence the question of why are countries not changing the rules so the large multinational companies cannot achieve it."
I don't know. Probably some combination of cronyism, status quo bias, and the problem being very difficult to solve? Also it wasn't really front of mind in a big way in people's day to day political thinking in the US until about 5 years ago.
"but is there anywhere that this is true?"
It was a hypothetical, I was trying to provide a what-if analogy. I don't know if it is true or not true in itself.
"If the argument is that society needs to start collecting tax on wealth and forcing sales of assets, then so be it, but it should be stated as such."
That's some people's argument, but not mine. My only observation is that the company tax as it is currently implemented is extremely regressive. I'm not against regressive tax per se, but it's too regressive in this case. If large and small companies paid the same flat rate, I'd be pretty happy. How to achieve it, I don't know.
Hence the question of why are countries not changing the rules so the large multinational companies cannot achieve it.
> As an analogy, it'd be like a road worker paying 30 percent tax on a $100k income and a company CEO paying 0-5 percent tax on a $10m income.
This seems unrelated to my question, but is there anywhere that this is true? All the examples of this I am familiar with in the US involve ignoring the fact that the CEO is not getting $10m of cash income, otherwise they would be paying a lot more tax than someone with $100k cash income. Which is stupid and invalidates any point trying to be made.
If the argument is that society needs to start collecting tax on wealth and forcing sales of assets, then so be it, but it should be stated as such.