Comment by specproc
2 months ago
This tax was introduced as a straightforward way to actually get tax revenues out of a multi-billion dollar industry that does not come remotely close to paying its fair share of tax in the UK.
The digital services tax was a limited counter to aggressive tax avoidance by US multinationals. Unfortunately, even though it's peanuts in the grand scheme of things, it's looking like it'll get offered up as sacrifice to the King in Orange.
UK corporations are expected to pay ~20% corporation tax, individuals pay _substantially_ more on their incomes. We've got a generation that've had to endure continual cuts to public services because "there's no money left", whilst foreign corporations make money off our public virtually tax free.
Google, Facebook etc., should pay their way or get out of our market.
That was the intent, but in reality the tax is fully remitted to Google's customers. I'm a small UK business and it appears on my invoice, so I'm effectively the one being taxed. This is why I object to the campaigners calling for 10% DST. They don't realise the tax is mostly remitted back onto UK businesses, not the trillion dollar giants.
What taxes on a business would not be eventually remitted to the customers?
Businesses are traditionally taxed on their profits, not their turnover. Being a turnover tax, DST acts more like VAT does for consumers. Mathematically it has to be passed onto the customers, it just makes Google the collection agent on behalf of the government. This is why turnover taxes are such a bad idea.
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Out of interest, is that an advertising invoice or something like GCP?
I'm sorry, but until we can find a way to close down the countless other tax loopholes exploited by multinationals, I'd be completely happy with a 10% DST on any advertising targeting UK citizens. Low-hanging fruit.
Google Ads specifically.