Cog wrote:Corporations don't pay tax, they simply collect it. The consumer pays every bit of it. So for those who want to punish those oil companies, good luck with that particular idea.
in 2003 Chevron Australia had a subsidiary in the US, Chevron Finance Corporation (CFC), raise $US2.45 billion in outside funds on the commercial paper market at an average 2 per cent interest.
This was cheap money, which was possible because Chevron Corporation, the group's ultimate parent, guaranteed the loan.
CFC loaned the money to Chevron Australia, its parent, but this loan wasn't guaranteed by Chevron Corporation.
It was an unsecured loan in Australian dollars, which allowed CFC to bump up the interest to the Australian bank bill rate plus a 4.14 per cent margin.
That interest started at 8.2 per cent in 2004 and by 2008 was 11.2 per cent.
This interest differential made the scheme a nice little earner for CFC – and it turned out none of it was taxable in the US, because CFC was a subsidiary of Chevron Australia, under the US tick-the-box regime.
From 2004 to 2008 CFC earned profits of $1.1 billion from the loan, which it paid as dividends back to Chevron Australia, which didn't pay tax on the money either, under the US-Australia tax treaty, which aims to avoid double taxation . . . or in this case, to enable double non-taxation.
Multinational oil giant Chevron has been hit with a tax bill of about $300 million after losing a landmark profit-shifting case that could have global implications for the way tax is assessed.
The Australian Tax Office's case in the Federal Court case has been closely watched by the tax and business community, and will give the ATO greater confidence to challenge other multinationals about their tax affairs.
The tentacles of multinational corporations like Chevron must pay tax wherever they unfurl.
Labor senator Sam Dastyari
Lore wrote:Maybe I'm a wet blanket on a New Year, but does it really matter what you did this year to save the planet? Other then to make yourself feel good? The human species as a whole is already beyond late in doing anything that will make much of a difference in what's to come.
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