Amazon Europe Unit Paid No Taxes on $55B Sales in 2021

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-04-20/amazon-europe-unit-paid-no-taxes-on-55-billion-sales-in-2021

by doener • 4 years ago

48 4 4 years ago

legitster• 4 years ago

“Across Europe, we pay corporate tax amounting to hundreds of millions of euros,” an Amazon spokesperson said. In the filings, a note states that the $1 billion net tax benefit is “mainly due to the use of net losses carried forward in accordance with the tax consolidation system.”

So, buried in all this, the VAT tax is doing it's thing. They are paying taxes where fulfillment is happening - their European HQ is going to be a loss center.

“We are investing heavily in creating jobs and infrastructure across Europe — more than 100 billion euros since 2010”, an Amazon representative said. “Corporation tax is based on profits, not revenues, and last year Amazon EU Sarl made a loss as we opened more than 50 new sites across Europe and created over 65,000 well-paid jobs, taking our total European permanent workforce to over 200,000”, the spokesperson added.

This is the same thing they did in the US: avoid posting a profit if they can help it; spend every dollar they make in growing the company; get free money by skipping taxes.

It's hard to be too mad at it - the point of tax codes being written this way is to encourage companies to spend their money hiring people and growing. But still, Amazon being able to grow rapidly because their investors don't care about negative cashflows does seem like an unfair advantage against all of the companies that do actually have to pay for things

rasz• 4 years ago

So, buried in all this, the VAT tax is doing it's thing.

as a reseller you do not pay VAT, you merely pass the VAT that was paid by the consumers.

youeseh• 4 years ago

If Amazon pays out everything it makes to its vendors and employees, then the vendors and employees pay taxes on income, no? Whats so bad about that?

credit_guy• 4 years ago

And Bloomberg paid $300mm on $10bn income (yes, income, not revenue). 3% tax rate. Kettle calling pot black and stuff …

https://www.propublica.org/article/the-secret-irs-files-trov...

Amazon Europe Unit Paid No Taxes on $55B Sales in 2021

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