... ask MNers to boycott Starbucks?

[legoballoon]

Personally, I won't be spending any money there again.

When I read the 'we pay our fair share of tax' statement, I almost choked on my (home made) hot chocolate. It's one law for the rich, another for us now is it?!

I think we should support small, UK-based independent coffee shops. Let's support businesses that generate wealth that is shared by local people.

Thanks Cinnabar, your posts are enlightening and informative.

Mary I am not really sure if you where calling me a fuckwit for saying that I will boycott. From what I have seen pretty much the consensus is that everyone agrees what they did is technically legal but it does not sit right with them. Paying substandard wages to farmers is not technically illegal but people choose to buy fair trade. It is an issue that crystallizes the frustration of seeing the poor and disabled get fucked but the other side having different rules or frankly a different board game all together.

mouse - do we have to pay for the lattes before we dump them. I am pretty sure we are talking about a seige situation. Surely someone from the MN OFRS brigade will have a Battering ram or some such.

By the way, does anyone know if there is a "Good Company Guide" anywhere? I would love to have a list of companies, that treat staff and suppliers fairly, try to have low impact on the environment and don't play the tax system like a fiddle. Especially on the run up to Christmas.

It's taken me two days to read every single post; but it's been fascinating. Thank you to those who have taken the time to post such detailed and comprehensive explanations.
I go to Starbucks a lot; I am now friends with a number of the staff as I see them so often and they have commented that it is a bit quieter than usual and they are a little worried. I will continue to support them until I am provided with solid evidence that something illegal has taken place.

"From what I have seen pretty much the consensus is that everyone agrees what they did is technically legal but it does not sit right with them"

I've been on this thread for three days, and that's not what I've seen. I've seen a range of some people not reading the thread, coming on and going "I hate Starbucks but why not!", people who go "I don't care if it's legal, I don't like it" and people who go "it's legal, it's justified, a boycott is ridiculous".

Cinnabar has pointed out (see analogy to marriage post above) that what they are doing is legal, pointed out reasons why, and also pointed out other companies (Greene King) who are avoiding tax in a quasi-legal and non-moral way. And raised the question - why starbucks when there are other companies out there who are more deserving of the vitriol.

Fusam what would starbucks need to do differently for you to end your boycott?

Princess, it's not illegal, it's just wrong to pay no tax in some years and 1% tax in others on profits of hundreds of billions of pounds.

The rest of us are having to make up the gap left by Starbucks. They use perfectly legal but ridiculous tricks to avoid paying any tax, like making up whatever figure they wish for loans and interest between subsidiaries and charging themselves whatever figure they want to invent for use of the logo. And so on.

Starbucks benefit from all the things taxpayers fund. Like roads, schools, hospitals, the police and courts. They are getting all that stuff which allows their business to happen and thrive without contributing a penny. That is clearly, obviously wrong!

If they want to operate without a state and without state facilities they can piss off to a country where the infrastructure is non-existent and the rule of law is absent like, I dunno, Somalia and see how much money they make there.

Absy - because you have to start somewhere. Otherwise we'd be letting murderers go free because there is more than one of them.

As I'm sure everyones' mothers used to say, two wrongs don't make a right.

But they are paying tax. They pay NI, Income tax etc. They pay tax the in the US (which is their home jurisdiction). They pay tax on the profits they make in the UK - in the most recent period they have not made hundreds of billions of pounds in profit. I think it was said further up in the thread that they submitted their accounts to HMRC who approved them.

If the law allows for tax breaks like that, it should be taken up with the government. Saying "bugger off to Somalia" is not particuarly helpful for the people employed by SB and it's kind of insulting to Somalia.

fusam, I'm commenting on the many people who have not read the thread, still think Starbucks have done something illegal, and state categorically that they intend to boycott a shop that they never use because the product is awful.

Which is very confused thinking at best, but I prefer the term fuckwittery .

Okay, so presumably you're also going to now go and start a "Boycott Greene King" thread and drum up support, as evidence has been provided that they're on the much murkier (morally speaking) end of the spectrum?

Are they making a profit of hundreds of millions of pounds in the UK?

I don't buy anything from there anyway.

Why pay for coffee there when I can get 4 sausages and a drink at Cooplands cheaper then one coffee there?

But they do pay tax. They are an American company and they pay CT in America. Otherwise they would be being double taxed if they paid it here as well.

So, let me understand - are people saying that the government should be pursuing individuals and companies who are doing legal things, approved by government authorities?

IME of people working for the government in trying to actually capture criminals who have been involved in activity, which is beyond a doubt, illegal - they barely have the resources to do that. Asking them to also go after people doing legal things will make them cry.

Oh I got what Cinnabar was saying. Why Starbucks? Because they are now in the spotlight and change or action needs a focus. It sucks for them but lot of people are deeply uncomfortable with the double standards. I don't agree with Cinnabar's analogy because everyone can get married. As a business owner I couldn't just walk into my high street accountant and set up my company this way (and if I could the country would go bankrupt). The system of such large scale avoidance is skewed towards the extremely wealthy in order to widen the wealth gap whilst politician bleat on about being in this together. It's more feudalism to me.

x-posted Absy - I was referring to edam saying Starbucks were making hundreds of (should have been) billions of pounds of profits in the UK. I don't think they are.

Given that by reducing their management charges from the US and increasing their profits in the UK, Starbucks would get to pay tax at a lower rate, I can't help thinking that Starbucks would actually be broadly in agreement with the idea that they should pay UK rather than US taxes. Maybe we could invite them to join the campaign? In fact perhaps they could hand out free Lattes for us to symbolically not thrown in the Thames in protest that they should be paying more British tax?

Absy - we should be outlawing/outregulating tax avoidance of this kind.

Somalia reference is entirely appropriate. If Starbucks doesn't want to pay the taxes that fund the legal system, town centres, roads, the schools that educate their staff and the NHS that treats them when they are sick, they are free to shut down operations in this country and go elsewhere. I don't think their business would do very well in a failed state that doesn't have a literate workforce or roads or the rule of law, though. Somalia is an example of a failed state.

Income tax and NI is neither here nor there - it's just far more difficult for Sarbucks to avoid. Most of it is deduced from employee's wages, it's not a voluntary goodwill payment by Starbucks, fgs.

People are showing revulsion at a skewed system but let's be honest there will be swifter change when they vote with their wallets. Politicians do not have the stomach to tangle with big business unless cornered. Powerful changes have taken place when people hold companies to account, the acceleration of the end of Apartheid for one.

"Because they are now in the spotlight and change or action needs a focus"

But that seems deeply unfair. Why go after companies, or highlight companies, that are doing legal things, when there are others that are doing much worse and are managing to fly under the radar, doesn't seem right. Also, why is Starbucks the only one, all of a sudden in the news? How weird is that? Why not Greene King?

I can assure you all, as a 'bucks employee, we are not generating hundreds of billions of pounds of profit

And I really wish people would stop coming into my shop and abusing my staff. We just make the coffee. As with most other large companies the accounting department is a separate entity.

I think unfair is the stories of people dying of cancer being assessed by Atos as being fit for work. Starbucks will be fine. I can't seem to muster up much sympathy for a company who wouldn't do me the same courtesy by paying fairly into the pot.

I have said earlier I am happy to subscribe to some rating system of ethicalness (?) for my christmas shopping. If anyone has any data, I have some statistical training and would be happy to crunch the numbers and put it up on a website.

Timothy as you seem to be working for a technically loss making operation I would be looking at other opportunities, I hear their might be demand for a coffee outlets.

I saw the end of a news item the other week, saying as soon as the Inland Revenue bring out new rules certain companies get their tax experts working on them to find loopholes. So I think the companies are being greedy even if they are working within the law. But that's capitalism I suppose and I don't consider myself a rampant socialist but I am uncomfortable with this practice.

Fusam I won't be looking for another opportunity as Starbucks have always treated me very well and I am very loyal to them. I have to say as a working parent I couldn't be happier with the support they provide.
However, if the boycott is successful I may be left with no choice but to seek an alternative.

fusam, that comment to Timothy is totally out of order .

Starbucks employees are being abused (and probably some will lose their jobs) because the newspapers (and their unquestioning followers) have highlighted the issue that the UK tax laws are badly written.

Is that fair?