Robert Peston on THAT Monbiot Tax Heist Article

[jackstarb]

Finally - Robert Peston has given his opinion on George Monbiot's 'Tax Heist of the Century' article.

Is Cameron giving companies the mother of all tax breaks?.

IMO - Peston gives a balanced and pragmatic view of what's actually proposed and why.

No doubt anti-Tory conspiratory theorists will continue to prefer Monbiot's view.

The problem with that is that competition for where companies base themselves and pay their executives is international. So it would need to be an international agreement - like we have had with the stricter capital regulations for banks.

I don't know about your example but it certainly sounds plausible. The thing is that would be a countries redundancy laws whilst if I understand you correctly you seem to be suggesting that the Government exerts some form of direct control at board room level in order to protect "society".

This was would be highly detrimental to investment as if an investor is putting up the capital he isn't going to want the Government having direct influence in how a company/project is being run.

The problem with that is that competition for where companies base themselves and pay their executives is international. So it would need to be an international agreement - like we have had with the stricter capital regulations for banks.

That may happen but I would still give it a try. How many will remove themselves from family and friends just to indulge their greed.

Maybe it is time to name and shame the greedy gits.

I loved the shit shoveled on Fred the Shred

hudd, I seem to be putting things badly.

Ok how about indirect control such as greater worker protection and my idea of pay multiples.

Maybe if Dyson had be forced to pay far higher redundancy pay he might still have his products made in the UK.

Well I happen to think that the case for financial privacy for anyone is pretty weak, as is the case any business dealings to be private, but that's to do with thinking these things distort markets.

But really senior executives don't care where they live. Because they are basically never there and spend their whole time in airports.

Lots of people, even with families change city or country all the time in order to advance their careers - I don't think we can assume that the lure of home is strong enough to counter act pressures to leave.

The problem with forcing people to keep manufacturing here by making it expensive to move is that they may then not be able to compete and go out of business, and no one moves in to replace them as they know the cost of leaving will be so great.

France has a real problem with companies not employing people on permanent contracts as it makes them to difficult to get rid of.

newwave- I think its an interesting idea and perhaps there are areas where regulations could be increased although I'm aware that many people in the business world feel we have too much red tape and that it is harming business.

Regarding pay I don't think the Government should limit the multiple of pay between lowest and highest paid workers in the private sector. The shareholders should decide on issues like this within the company. Its different in the public sector where the Government is the shareholder and we're all shareholders in that so I think a case could be made.

Hudd indeed the shareholders should decide on this issue but whilst the pension fund directors are part of the snouts in the trough brigade it wont happen.

TCNY, Ok then how do the Scandenavian countries have a far more equitable and higher taxing society than the UK and still have a working economy after all the multi-national businesses left or maybe is it that a company like Nokia in Finland feels it has a social bond with the country taht nurtured it.

The problem is that the Anglo Saxon economies are based upon greed and explotation.

I think the Coalition is right- I'd say that in general the more senior you are, the less location matters. Also, if the decision is (e.g.) where to put a factory, then no-one has to move. You can just hire locally for the plant. A few people from HQ might have to go and live in (eg) Poland for a few years to oversee the build, but they could just weekly commute. The world is getting a lot smaller and places which seemed so far flung a couple of decades ago now seem like they're just next door. This is part of the problem we have at the moment because downward pressure on wages due to inequalities in global purchasing power is intensifying as it's never been easier to relocate some of your business overseas.

On the Ford issue, when Ford closed Dagenham, they lost about 3,500 jobs. However, they'd just axed another 4,000 in Germany/Belgium (in 1999/2000) so I'm not sure we can say that the higher European redundancy costs protected those jobs. There was some transfer of Dagenham production to Cologne, but that was because the plant was newer so they could switch between models more quickly (i.e. they needed to be able to do shorter production runs of more models) and because Cologne could make a Fiesta 6hrs faster than Dagenham. Therefore it was much a decision about which plant was most suitable for their future needs than which workforce

Newwave - Denmark decreased unemployment rates by lowering workers employment rights.

In Denmark the state provides very generous welfare payments for the unemployed, but the 'flexibility' of the Labour force means that unemployment rates remained low.

They call it 'flexicurity'.

Basically it's all about attracting businesses and encouraging them to grow.

As Peston says in the article:

"It's the tax paid by the millions of us who work for companies and institutions which largely pays for the state, not the direct taxation of the companies themselves."

Good article.

Actually, I like Monbiot. I think he's a good writer and his climate work is always highly readable.

His tax heist piece was ill thought out and no one has run with it.

I hope it doesn't ruin his cred on climate, because he was making headway there, I think.

To attempt to write off Monbiot due to this article is clutching at straws and isn't cricket.

He's one of the few courageously anti system media types left. If he got a few facts wrong or tripped over his own feet somewhat in a bid to prove his own preconceived theses does not an unreliable commentator make and his shortcomings on this occasion are ones tolerated all the time in journalists/commentators supporting the system status quo.

Everyone makes mistakes, Monboit is only human after all. But where was the peer review? Where was the editor? Did anyone check the facts? Or did they just cut & paste his article into the paper?

glasnost the first rule of any journo is that if you are going to say unpalatable things about the status quo...they had better be verifiable.

Otherwise you will be undermined.

Monbiot knows that perfectly well. He is not some sap who doesn;'t know the score.

Yes, Scandanavian countries do tax but not enormously so. We are at about 40% Denmark is at about 50, Sweden 49, Norway and Finland at about 43.

We are at 39.

So yes they do tax more than us but only at the max by the amount that we tax more than, say, the US. (28%).

Your actual LOW tax territories charge much less - Hong Kong for instance - charge 12%.

Compared to OECD countries we are solid mid-table performers when it comes to tax.

Niceguy2 - There is no peer review in journalism. That's why we value academic papers more than The Daily Mail.

Unless you are Claig.

Yes, I agree word but as I said in my post these strict criteria are rarely applied with such ardour to hacks sucking up to or directly on the payroll of that system (ie the overriding majority).

I'll still read Monbiot even though I find his writing a tad contorted at times.

i usually can't stand Peston but it was a good article.

It's unfair to say other news outlets didn't follow up the story - actually many wrote about it when it was announced in December but it was a bit of a non-story really, as Peston shows.

Peston (and Monbiot) also failed to point out that the proposals were first made under Labour so it's not even a specifically Tory policy.

'There is no peer review in journalism. That's why we value academic papers more than The Daily Mail.'

Many of us have come to trust the Daily Mail, due to its outstanding record in presenting the truth and cutting through the tripe over many years.

The Daily Mail was one of the world's first sources to inform us of Climategate, when more "respected" news sources remained strangely silent.

It all really depends on who the scientists are and who the poor peer reviewers are. Professor Ludwig von Drake, Donald Duck's uncle from Austria, is a nice enough chap, but the Daily Mail would never employ him.

I think you can find Ludwig's column in the Guardian's weekend edition, but I am not sure, as I don't like throwing money away.

Claig - you don't need to buy the Guardian - it's much better online. Plus, you get all those, often, highly amusing CIF comments.

good point jackstarb. I do occasionally look at it, to see if the public is wide awake in the CIF comment section. Just checked Monbiot's Environment blog, and am pleased to see that the public is wide awake. They have most probably been well informed by Daily Mail articles. What would we do without the Daily Mail? It doesn't bear thinking about.

Didn't the Mail pick up and re-report a recent Guardian Barclays Corporation Tax article? Do I detect a slight merging?

Oh dear, I hope not.

Yes and the Daily Mail-Guardian axis has further been strengthened by their convergent concerns re. the census.

Why don't they just formally merge and could cut down on renting of commercial space etc?