[zdkl]

No, the intent of the law is absolutely unmistakeable especially in tax-related domains. Bad-faith actors don't deserve the statutory crevices through which they divert their accounting. Fix the moral compass of their boards and officers or assign them a post-facto "we really don't like what you did there" penalty. Could be a fine, business restriction or mandatory supervision by the public authorities.

The notion that these companies should only be beholden to the strictest letter of the law is nonsensical.

[Spivak]

> The notion that these companies should only be beholden to the strictest letter of the law is nonsensical.

Right, they should be beholden to the letter when it benefits them and the spirit when it benefits them. Seriously -- you wouldn't want to live in a world where this isn't the case.

* Nobody should have a technicality in the letter result in fines and punishment when they were following the spirit in earnest.

* Similarly, nobody who takes care to follow the letter exactly should be punished even if it violates the spirit. Because otherwise people and companies have no clear way to know what is and isn't allowed.

It's only when someone is violating both the letter and the spirit that there are grounds for punishment.

[zdkl]

Yes that argument makes sense for rational actors, but I believe some privte organisations are simply too well adapted to the sane model for it to be effectively usable to mitigate their bad actions.

I'd argue corporations specifically could do with some more fear of the stick, in the cases where they fall in a grey area.

[sgt101]

I think that all relies on a lot of judgement and perspective. I think that the way to fix things is to shrink down (or expand) the letter of the law so as to catch the corner cases and to protect people appropriately (from the application of the law).

I think that the letter of the law must be applied generously and sparingly - but the rapid expansion of egregious evasion should be addressed because it is having corrosive social effects that will compromise this attitude and the norms that underpin it.

[charlesdm]

Avoidance, you mean. I think there are more distorting effects in the market at the moment than tax avoidance, such as extremely low interest rates and quantitative easing (outside of the US).

[sgt101]

Yes - agree, sorry sloppy language. I agree that both of the other distortions are important and difficult too - but I think imposed on authorities by circumstance.

Also having other things in play doesn't mean that this thing shouldn't be fixed...

[charlesdm]

Yes, agree, but I just think in many cases the resources and effort it requires for tax authorities to win these cases often makes it not worth it.

A full tax case can easily run for 5 to 10 years, and the upside will be relatively limited. A lot has already been done in recent years and for a lot of EU companies the actual tax rate they pay has gone up with a few percentage points. But now most of the low hanging fruit is gone.