G7: Rich nations back deal to tax multinationals
I do wonder if we wouldn&#x27;t be better off eliminating corporation tax entirely.<p>The revenue of a corporation can, roughly, be:<p>1. Spent on goods or services from another company (including freelancers, contractors, etc.)<p>2. Spent on rent<p>3. Spent on capital purchases<p>4. Spent on wages<p>5. Spent on debt repayment or other forms of financing<p>6. Paid out in dividends<p>7. Spent on share buybacks<p>8. Invested in something else<p>Items 1-5 are all good things that we want companies to do, and corporation tax is normally applied after this spending is accounted for. Items 6 and 7 ought to be taxed, and frequently are (dividends and buybacks create income for individuals who will pay tax on that income). Item 8 is a bit vaguer, but probably shouldn&#x27;t be taxed in most cases (if we&#x27;re worried about companies parking cash in very low-risk assets, then super-low yields are effectively a tax on that anyway).<p>All that the corporation tax adds to this picture is the creation of work in tax avoidance services, and an unjust inequality between those firms that can afford those services and are structured to take advantage of the rules, and those that can not and are not.<p>It&#x27;s not obvious to me that corporation tax &#x2F;can&#x2F; be fixed, and so it may be better simply to scrap it and replace it with something more difficult to dodge.<p>EDIT: formatting