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El Reg reports
Steve Wozniak has spoken out against Apple's tax affairs, saying all companies ought to pay 50 per cent in taxes.
Speaking to BBC Radio 5 Live he said: "I don't like the idea that Apple might be unfair--not paying taxes the way I do as a person.
"I do a lot of work, I do a lot of travel and I pay over 50 per cent of anything I make in taxes and I believe that's part of life and you should do it."
Asked if Apple should pay that amount, he replied: "Every company in the world should."
According to Woz, money was never a factor when he started the biz with Steve Jobs 40 years ago. He added: "Steve Jobs started Apple Computers for money, that was his big thing and that was extremely important and critical and good."
Europe is currently scrutinising Ireland's tax arrangements with Apple over an alleged sweetheart deal with the company. Some have speculated the probe could lead to Apple paying $8bn in back taxes, even though the case is against the Irish government.
(Score: 2) by jdavidb on Monday April 25 2016, @07:43PM
ⓋⒶ☮✝🕊 Secession is the right of all sentient beings
(Score: 2) by maxwell demon on Monday April 25 2016, @08:13PM
Quoting re-added:
So in essence you are not happy with him having his citizen rights?
So you think the First Amendment should be amended to read
?
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 2) by jdavidb on Monday April 25 2016, @08:17PM
ⓋⒶ☮✝🕊 Secession is the right of all sentient beings
(Score: 2, Informative) by bob_super on Monday April 25 2016, @08:35PM
Tired of democracy, then... Plenty of dictatorships are available for you to pick your favorite.
(Score: 2) by jdavidb on Monday April 25 2016, @08:59PM
ⓋⒶ☮✝🕊 Secession is the right of all sentient beings
(Score: 3, Insightful) by bob_super on Monday April 25 2016, @09:06PM
Please explain how you take away " the right to vote on what happens to other people's money" and still have a democracy.
Kindly provide realistic alternatives to prove that the dichotomy is false.
(Score: 2) by jdavidb on Monday April 25 2016, @09:20PM
ⓋⒶ☮✝🕊 Secession is the right of all sentient beings
(Score: 2) by bob_super on Monday April 25 2016, @09:47PM
I'm waiting for the answer to the "false dichotomy" part: what do you propose that's not dictatorship? Anarchy?
(Score: 3, Touché) by jdavidb on Monday April 25 2016, @10:00PM
ⓋⒶ☮✝🕊 Secession is the right of all sentient beings
(Score: 2) by bob_super on Monday April 25 2016, @10:11PM
Then why would you care about the tax level? "Money" has no value in Anarchy.
(Score: 2) by jdavidb on Wednesday April 27 2016, @12:32AM
ⓋⒶ☮✝🕊 Secession is the right of all sentient beings
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday April 25 2016, @09:10PM
Split the difference: come to America and join the Woz.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by maxwell demon on Monday April 25 2016, @08:39PM
What makes you think that the money you owe as taxes is your money? Do you really think you would have gotten the same amount of money for your products, services or work if there would not be taxes to pay?
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Monday April 25 2016, @09:00PM
^^ Jdavidb
You need to drop the "me vs. the world" attitude, which I'm sure is mostly just a small piece that crops up in political discussions. The I-got-mine mindset is really all about greed, and society would collapse if everyone actually tried to follow it. Every road would be a toll road, you'd better have a few hundred dollars cash if you want the police or fireman to even show up. Sick and don't have money? Die in the gutter plzthxbye. Even worse monopolies would crop up, with competition eliminated by force. Basically, the average person would VERY quickly become less free as we return to tribal warfare.
(Score: 2, Disagree) by jdavidb on Monday April 25 2016, @09:00PM
What makes you think that the money you owe as taxes is your money?
There's a lot more reason to think that than there is to think the reverse. This question could easily be turned around.
Do you really think you would have gotten the same amount of money for your products, services or work if there would not be taxes to pay?
I think we would all be getting much more money if there were not taxes to pay.
ⓋⒶ☮✝🕊 Secession is the right of all sentient beings
(Score: 3, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Monday April 25 2016, @09:50PM
You wouldn't have a job numbskull.
You wouldn't have a free road to drive on that is kept reasonably safe my the police. You wouldn't have stop signals or street lights. You wouldn't have clean potable water pumped into your house and you certainly wouldn't be enjoying the cheap electricity you have right now. You would never make it to the office.
Taxes pay for all of that infrastructure. Without the shared cost to all of us, none of us could afford the individual costs related to police, roads, firemen, water testing, street lights, bridges, etc.
The only reason any of us can afford all of that is because we all pay towards it, even the stuff we don't necessarily individually need. Due to the facts that corporations draw high profits from utilizing these things for free it is only fair they pay for them along with everyone else.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday April 26 2016, @06:57AM
(Score: 3, Insightful) by aristarchus on Monday April 25 2016, @10:30PM
There's a lot more reason to think that than there is to think the reverse. This question could easily be turned around.
No, it can't. It is not your money, it the Federal Reserve's money, they are just letting you hold on to it for a while. And your house is not your house, it is just letting you live in it for a while. And this earth is not your earth, if anything, you belong to the earth, not the other way around. No the question cannot be turned around. And not to put too fine a point on it, your life does not belong to you. It is only the restraint of your fellow citizens that lets you pretend to "own" anything. For all things belong to god, and if you don't pay your taxes, you may get to find this out first hand.
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Monday April 25 2016, @10:44PM
No it's not. It's her majesties govenment's money. (you insensitive clod)
(Score: 2) by aristarchus on Monday April 25 2016, @11:08PM
"Render unto Elizabeth", I always say! Money belongs to whoever's face is on it! Now about that Canadian money often referred to as "The Loony" . . .
(Score: 2) by maxwell demon on Tuesday April 26 2016, @09:27AM
Then you are not thinking very far. To start with, let's assume everyone would have more dollars. What would happen? Well, with everyone having more dollars, everyone would have more dollars to spend, and therefore demand for products would go up. And then economics 101 kicks in: Higher demand leads to higher prices. And that means while you have more dollars, the dollars are worth less, and therefore you don't have more money.
But that's not all. The road on which you drive to work, do you pay for that? Well, you do, through taxes. If there were no taxes, either you'd have no road to drive on, or you would have to pay for the road directly. And then, who makes sure that you'll not get robbed on the way to work? Well, the police does. Paid by tax money. No taxes, no police. So plan to pay for your personal security, too. OK, but now the security company you hired happened to just take your money, but not actually help you when you are robbed; a fact that you of course only find out after you've been robbed. So what do you do? Sue them? Too bad that the courts are paid for by taxes. But maybe you've got the money to not just pay your lawyer, but also pay a private court (and at the same time manage to make sure the private court isn't getting enough bribes from the security company to rule against you — who would stop them from acting that way?). So that private court tells the security company that it has to pay you compensation. How do you get that compensation? Hire yet another contractor to enforce that? But that contractor has to be more powerful than the security firm, and at the same time more trustworthy. And probably will be even more expensive.
Well, in short, you'd pay much more than you currently pay in taxes, in order to maintain a more miserable life.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 2) by jdavidb on Tuesday April 26 2016, @08:13PM
You are absolutely right; I should have said I believe everyone would have more wealth, not money. Also, we wouldn't have imperialistic wars going on across the globe funded by the wealth that is being taken from us.
As for not having roads, I don't understand at all why that would be an issue. My take on that is the same as Larken Rose [goodreads.com]'s. To me the issues you raise sound like this discussion [facebook.com].
Hmm, looks like L. Rose has an even longer comment on this [youtube.com] that I haven't checked out yet. And I love this little ditty on the subject [youtube.com].
ⓋⒶ☮✝🕊 Secession is the right of all sentient beings
(Score: 2) by maxwell demon on Wednesday April 27 2016, @08:02AM
Maybe you should re-read my post. I had an either-or there. Your jumping on the "no roads" part (which I didn't say that way, so that comment you linked doesn't apply) and largely ignoring the rest looks like a classical red herring to me.
But as it seems clear to me that further discussion will not lead anywhere, this will be my last message in this thread.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 2) by jdavidb on Wednesday April 27 2016, @10:57AM
ⓋⒶ☮✝🕊 Secession is the right of all sentient beings
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Monday April 25 2016, @09:03PM
If this were his sincerely held religious belief, then it would be protecting *his* freedom to tax business at 50%.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday April 26 2016, @07:33PM
Well, sir, while I find your position commendable and your steadfastness for it... a bit odd, I need you to go back and review the reason why men institute governments among themselves and why those governments have the authority to fund themselves through taxation.
Sorry. Taxation is not theft, at least given any workable definition of theft. Perhaps that's the problem here. Your definition of theft is unworkable.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday April 26 2016, @07:35PM
Well, one other thing that might be the problem here. Hate to reply to myself. You've decided that we should all agree to this ideal that is completely impractical. You're one of those people who constantly whine because the ideal is unattainable in any practical sense. You're letting perfect be the enemy of good.
(Score: 2) by jdavidb on Tuesday April 26 2016, @08:05PM
You've decided that we should all agree to this ideal that is completely impractical.
That is what I see you doing, as well.
I need you to go back and review the reason why men institute governments among themselves and why those governments have the authority to fund themselves through taxation.
You need me to what? That is a weird way of speaking. I don't work for you or have any association with you, so what you might want to do is ask me to do something rather than simply telling me to do it.
In discussions like this I frequently bring up what the Declaration of Independence says, which I think addresses your concern, and is exactly the reason I believe the way I do: "all men ... are endowed ... with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness"
The phrase "deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed" rules out taxation as we know it. It is certainly fair to create an institution that serves to secure rights [youtube.com]. And it is certainly fair for those who consent to this institution to ask for dues from the members to cover expenses, just like any other institution. But what is not fair is to extract payment from those who do not consent. The institution doesn't gain rights that don't belong to those who created it, such as the right to take money from one's neighbor.
And I and many, many other people feel that the current form of government is absolutely destructive of the end (securing rights), and we want the right to alter or abolish and institute new government (new rights-protecting institutions) that seem most likely to us to effect our safety and happiness. We don't seek to take away your right to keep your existing government if you wish; we simply seek the right to not have powers exercised against us that we did not consent to. The present form of government is the biggest rights violator ever.
And no, the answer to that is not for us to be forced to abandon our property and possessions and go live somewhere else. There is no reason that we should not be allowed to create competing institutions so long as we and those institutions don't violate anyone else's rights to life, liberty, or property. Your institution, your government, is routinely violating people's rights to life, liberty, and property, both here and around the globe. I'd like to see that curtailed by everybody's right to not support it being respected.
ⓋⒶ☮✝🕊 Secession is the right of all sentient beings