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Comment by roc | Hacker News Reader

Ethics aside, Google shouldn't seek to deprive nations of tax revenue because they benefit in no small part from that money. They hire employees educated with government money, buy research projects funded with government money, build data centers that depend upon public infrastructure, etc. Frankly, without government money, Google would not exist.

By gaming the tax systems, they're not only flipping the bird to the ladder they stood upon to create Google, but they're strangling the future pipeline for the very government products they depend upon.

And people only call Google out for crap like this because they insist on running around claiming they "Do No Evil". They set the bar higher for themselves. If they didn't want it there, they should shut up about it already.

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Most of their tax money would not be spent on the specific items you describe. For every $100 google spends in taxes, roughly $16 will be spent on education (mostly education for underachievers who would never work at google), $4.90 will be spent on transportation infrastructure, $0.30 will be spent on basic research and $0.1 will be spent on communications infrastructure.

On the other hand, for every $100 google pays in taxes, $23.2 will be given to unproductive old people and $14.8 will be given to unproductive non-old people.

It's a fallacy to focus solely on the desirable components of government spending. The lions share of taxes are simply transfers from productive people to unproductive people. If Google wants to avoid this, I see nothing wrong with that.

What you say is true and I think you both make good points.

When someone above asked "Why would Google want to pay a higher tax rate?" I thought, they would if it was in their best interest- I think we all agree on this.

Now here is the crazy part of my post- A company like Google which could conceivably bring in billions of dollars by changing its tax setup, should have some bargaining power. I don't think anything like this exists anywhere, but wouldn't it be cool if Google could get lawmakers to state that x% of Google's tax dollars will set up schools that focused on teaching 'gifted' children technology? And y% pays for technology infrastructure? Wouldn't that be fukken sweet? It would give Google an incentive to keep money in the USA, give back to what gave birth to it, reduce its burden of finding and educating new hires, reduce it's burden of setting up infrastructure, and benefit society across the board without having to wait for a some Google Billionaire to have a ethical epiphany in his old age and attempt philanthropy.

What do you think lobbying is?

Google and others can already target things through private philanthropy and private investment.

> "It's a fallacy to focus solely on the desirable components of government spending."

Without going into what proportion of spending might directly benefit Google, I do agree with you. Return on tax revenue is nowhere close to 1:1 nor is it being spent optimally.

But Google does not decide how that money is allotted. They can't say "I'm only paying 25% because I only approve of 25% of expenditures." When they limit their exposure to 25% of what it might be (paying 4% instead of 20%) they're still cutting the desirable spending to 25% of its budget.

So they're still strangling those things they benefit from.

And if the giants generations before Google had done the same, one wonders whether the component technologies and projects and research that Google built from would have been part of the lucky 25% of spending that survived inevitable cuts?

Your original post implied google is being a freeloader: "...they benefit in no small part from that money. [...] Frankly, without government money, Google would not exist."

I'm just pointing out that if google limits their exposure to 25% of what it might be, they are still paying for all the services they use and far more. They pay not be paying for all the services you want them to pay for, but that isn't the same thing.

I'm also pointing out that it's not quite honest to list only the useful government services, when they are dwarfed by wealth transfers. That's a tactic worthy of congress, similar to naming a law "To amend the Internal Revenue Code of 1986 to provide earnings assistance and tax relief to members of the uniformed services, volunteer firefighters, and Peace Corps volunteers, and for other purposes" (where "other purposes" == bank bailouts).

Why is it evil for companies to take advantage of tax breaks, but the lawmakers who created the tax breaks get a pass. Shouldn't it be the lawmakers who are responsible?

+1. This is similar to the major reason I despise the band U2 (besides their awful music): they bitch and moan about helping poor children in Africa. They even recently complained that the British gov't doesn't send enough money to impoverished countries. But they have a major tax haven set up that deprives the gov't of tax revenue.

You just need to be consistent. Google has gotten a lot of benefits out of their "Do No Evil" motto; in my mind, they are held to a higher standard than GE or IBM.

So they preach that the government doesn't spend money on the right things, but then in practice don't want to give money to that government? The hypocrites!

The point is U2 try to get people to be less selfish and more giving, all the while exploiting what they can to keep more of their money

That would be hypocritical if they were trying to get people to be less selfish and to give more to the government. It's certainly not hypocritical if they're giving a significant portion of that would-be-taxed money to charities.

Not exactly. Artists (musical, visual, literary) in Ireland aren't taxed on the proceeds of their sales, largely because Ireland benefits substantially in tourism and other revenue from exporting its culture.

But U2 is FROM Ireland...

> Ethics aside, Google shouldn't seek to deprive nations of tax revenue because they benefit in no small part from that money.

I think the issue that people are disagreeing on here is who would make the better use of money: Google or a government? If Google paid $1 million more in taxes, would that be a net benefit or detriment to society? Google can do good things with that money, and so can a government. But which one can give higher marginal utility?

They hire employees educated with government money...

And those employees pay more taxes because they draw high salaries paid to them by Google, which they could not have gotten without their education.

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