Comments by "" (@TheHuxleyAgnostic) on "Andrew Yang Gets Called-Out Over His Health Care Lie" video.
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@AstroMortuum Here's what's not considered "staples", in Canada: electricity, phone, phone service, computers, internet service, personal hygiene products, household cleaning products, home maintenance, vehicle maintenance, and all kinds of things poor people will have to pay extra for. Sure, if you sit in the dark and watch stars for fun, you won't be at all affected by a VAT.
Yang's revenue projection was also originally based on the entire economy. The more he exempts, the larger the shortfall he'll have, and his plan already starts with almost a trillion dollar deficit.
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@WiseWeeabo It's not about total government revenue generated, because a 10% federal sales tax would do about the same thing. A VAT only keeps track of the exchanges along the way better, so it's harder to dodge the final step, but likewise ends up being a tax on the final consumer.
If you're handing consumers $3t, who paid the VAT is what matters. If Amazon still paid no taxes, but has a 2% share of US consumer spending, then you've made them $60b extra dollars a year, and they're still not paying in.
I get that many gangers fantasize that the VAT will only tax yachts and stuff, but non-staples include phones, phone service, computers (even cheap ones), internet service, TVs, cable, games, toys, basically any entertainment with a cost, personal hygiene products, household cleaning products, home maintenance, vehicle maintenance ... all kinds of crap. A lot of countries exempt staples. Corporations still aren't the ones paying the tax. Consumers are.
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@mircogam Now you're making up fake crap for what he supposedly really means, but never said. No, almost no gangers I've come across know how a VAT actually works, let alone most Americans. No, he outright claims on his VAT page, and in multiple interviews and rallies, that a VAT is a way to make corporations "pay their fair share", not their owners. He had an absolutely ridiculous rally, where he both claimed Google was moving money to its EU headquarters in Ireland to avoid paying taxes, and that a VAT wouldn't let them get away without paying taxes. Ireland has a freaking 23% VAT rate. They obviously don't give a shit about the VAT, because they don't pay it. They're there for Ireland's low corporate tax rate. Plus, what you, a supposed account, aren't seeming to grasp is that, if you make Amazon an extra $60b a year, then you're making Bezos something like an extra $6b a year. He'd have to personally blow through over $60b on goods and services with a VAT to pay in more than you're making him, which would never happen. He could by a new $1b yacht every year, pay $100m in VAT, and still be in the plus $5.9b, from Yang's plan. Meanwhile, yes, there will be some poor people who will get zero economic benefit from the UBI but will still have to pay the VAT on many things. And, it doesn't matter if someone already getting $1000+ in assistance opts in or out. They can't opt out of paying the VAT. They'd be worse off, having to pay 10% more on numerous things.
No, a business doesn't need to absorb part of the VAT, if it doesn't want to. Only the smallest of businesses aren't required to register for the VAT, which aren't competition. Or, the business is in a VAT exempt or zero rated sector, and also isn't competition. These giant tech companies are already operating in countries with a VAT. They don't absorb shit. When the EU switched from seller's VAT rate to buyer's VAT rate, they started charging the buyer's full VAT rate.
Yang is skipping many of the things other countries do to make corporations and the rich pay in. The UK has higher marginal income tax rates, a higher minimum wage, double the union participation to negotiate better wages for workers, a stamp tax, etc. Scandinavian countries have ridiculously high union participation, so high they don't even need the government involved in setting minimum wages, higher marginal tax rates than the UK, paid parental leave, more paid vacation days, Norway owns a 60+% share in their oil production, Sweden has businesses pay into a retraining program with an 80+% success rate, etc. They also have about double the percentage of the population working decently paid government jobs, than the US doea. Then those countries tax their better paid, higher standard of living, consumers with a VAT. A VAT doesn't make corporations pay in. If you think Bezos only being able to recover half the VAT on his cell phone, because he uses it half the time for personal calls, is him "paying his fair share", then you're an idiot.
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@Tsudico Man, you have zero clue what you're talking about. It was a £24 VAT on top of a £120 charge (24 is 20% of 120). The ad buyer paid £144. Google collected the £24 and sent it to the government. The remaining £120 goes into Google's pocket. The business who initially paid the £24 then gets it credited back from the government, along with any other VAT they've paid on business expenses. You're completely fabricating some other VAT payment, not able to figure out who pays it, and then deciding Google must have. There's no magical other £18 VAT payment Google has made to nobody, paying £96 for nothing.
If Google does have some business expense they paid input VAT on, during the same VAT collection period, they would reclaim that amount, just like the business paying for the ad. Say Google bought a $12 computer chord, and paid £2.40 in VAT on top of that. Then, instead of sending the government the full £24, they'd keep £2.40 and send the government £21.60.
Fun fact: Even of a business pays more input VAT than they collect in output VAT, they will still get their input VAT credited back to them. Meaning, a company having a bad sales period will be credited back their input VAT by the consumers of businesses that had a good sales period.
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