[yc1010]

> There's also no real need to tax them, as you can tax their owners.

Thats what happens in Ireland, corporation tax is lowish (12.5%) and theres not that many loopholes/concessions as in other EU states where companies can reduce their corporate tax to near nothing already

BUT personal taxes are a murder

Lets say you are a director of startup and the company has€100000 left after costs and taxes etc, lets say as director you want to pay yourself a salary of 100K for your hard work, you be lucky you be left with 50K after income tax, PAYE/PRSI insurance tax and "Universal Social Charge"

On the money that you have left you would have to pay for medical insurance (aint free here like UK), VAT of 23% on almost anything you buy (more for cars, less for food etc), new property and water taxes and so on

Keep in mind that Ireland gets blamed for alot of this goings on, but its just a step on path large corporations take to move money onto Carribean.

[lazyjones]

That doesn't scare me, it's about the same here in Austria - on top of 25% corporate tax, 25% tax on dividends (capital income).