Best job for avoiding tax?

[winkywanky]

In my opinion HMRC had a breakthrough a few years ago on tax avoidance with a number of significant wins in court plus a raft of powerful legislation.  You really see very little tax planning that might be termed aggressive (as i defined above) now in the area of profit/income extraction.  For examples schemes to pay bonuses with no or reduced tax and NI.  Indeed any advisers selling such schemes are inevitably dodgy in my view as they know that the schemes will not work.  The era of selling packaged schemes for this planning is over.

There will also be bespoke specific planning for individual transactions and the like, but that is not on the industrial scale that we had a decade ago.

Much of the golf club talk you hear about people legally avoiding their tax liabilities is bullshit.

The area that does need addressing is that or multi national corps and especially digital businesses.  The authorities are working on this but currently being vetoed by the US.

I always found it ironic that the likes of JRC would go on about the evils of such tax planning but would then be as passionately against the EU which was (and still is) the best chance of tackling it!!

Unfortunately minimising such tax planning across international borders is fucking complicated!

Yes, the likes of Amazon and Apple and Google and Facebook and all the rest, all need to be made to pay their fair share, and we're talking Billions in tax avoidance. Added to their individual power is the almost overwhelming power of the US, and of course add to that the enormous power of the gingerhaired, gingerfaced twat currently 'in charge' there.

One of the great things about the EU (and there were some great things as well as all the administrative and protectionist dross) was that as a collective whole it provided a trading bloc of similar size and power to the US, with a real chance of negotiating with the US on a pretty well level footing. That is one of the things the UK will miss (which of course goes alongside our new opportunities, which we must embrace fully).

It's a funny thing, within the EU we were a powerful and valued member in many ways and they really didn't want us to go. But when finally we are on the outside, negotiating deals with the US as a relatively small and powerless nation where we don't get totally fucking shafted by Trump (intentionally or otherwise), is going to be very interesting, if not a little scary.

[King Nuts]

 negotiating deals with the US as a relatively small and powerless nation where we don't get totally fucking shafted by Trump (intentionally or otherwise), is going to be very interesting, if not a little scary.

I don't think that's an accurate statement of how things are. Have a look at this:

External Link/Members Only

Considering the population of the US is around five times our population, I'd say we're already punching way above our weight in terms of trade with the US.

[winkywanky]

I don't think that's an accurate statement of how things are. Have a look at this:

External Link/Members Only

Considering the population of the US is around five times our population, I'd say we're already punching way above our weight in terms of trade with the US.

We are, but isn't that with a degree of 'protection' from having been in the EU?

Yes, we know Trump likes us Brits, and he plays on his Scottish heritage and all the rest of it, but we're all aware of the pressure that we're under with the great desire of the US to sell us chicken with dodgy provenance, beef which has been grown on steroids and various medical services which may or may not be to the detriment of the NHS.

A trading deal with be give and take, and ultimately the power dynamic between us and the US has changed vastly now. We're not on an equal footing by virtue of our EU membership any more, we're effectively on our own. Trump will play hardball, and I hope Boris is up to the task. I actually think he basically is (as our recent negotiations with the EU have shown) but at the end of the day the power imbalance will work against us.

[Jimmyredcab]

We are, but isn't that with a degree of 'protection' from having been in the EU?

Yes, we know Trump likes us Brits, and he plays on his Scottish heritage and all the rest of it, but we're all aware of the pressure that we're under with the great desire of the US to sell us chicken with dodgy provenance.

We don’t exactly have a good record of safety with supermarket chickens, this is from the NHS site in 2014.


Friday 28 November 2014

“More than 70% of fresh chickens being sold in the UK are contaminated,” BBC News reports.

A Food Standards Agency (FSA) investigation found worryingly high levels of contamination with the campylobacter bug, which can cause food poisoning, on chickens being sold across the country. The Guardian reported a food scientist, Professor Tim Lang, calling for a “boycott of supermarket chicken because of 'scandalous' levels of contamination”.

Campylobacter is a type of bacteria thought to be the leading cause of food poisoning in the UK. Eating food contaminated with campylobacter can trigger symptoms such as nausea, vomiting, diarrhoea and stomach cramps.

[winkywanky]

We don’t exactly have a good record of safety with supermarket chickens, this is from the NHS site in 2014.


Friday 28 November 2014

“More than 70% of fresh chickens being sold in the UK are contaminated,” BBC News reports.

A Food Standards Agency (FSA) investigation found worryingly high levels of contamination with the campylobacter bug, which can cause food poisoning, on chickens being sold across the country. The Guardian reported a food scientist, Professor Tim Lang, calling for a “boycott of supermarket chicken because of 'scandalous' levels of contamination”.

Campylobacter is a type of bacteria thought to be the leading cause of food poisoning in the UK. Eating food contaminated with campylobacter can trigger symptoms such as nausea, vomiting, diarrhoea and stomach cramps.

If you don't cook a chicken properly there'll always be a risk from campylobacter, salmonella and other stuff too. It's incumbent on the consumer to make sure it gets cooked properly.

The standards of animal provenance are higher in the EU/UK than they are in the US. It's just that in the US they wash the chicken at the end of the process to cure all the ills from earlier in the chain.

I'd rather eat a chicken that had been better looked after and then had to be cooked properly, than eat a chicken that hadn't been looked after as well but just got 'sanitised' at the end.

Our food standards are only as good as the producers of course, nevertheless our standards are higher, and there to be followed.

PS good to see you back Jimmy 

[King Nuts]

We are, but isn't that with a degree of 'protection' from having been in the EU?

Yes, we know Trump likes us Brits, and he plays on his Scottish heritage and all the rest of it, but we're all aware of the pressure that we're under with the great desire of the US to sell us chicken with dodgy provenance, beef which has been grown on steroids and various medical services which may or may not be to the detriment of the NHS.

A trading deal with be give and take, and ultimately the power dynamic between us and the US has changed vastly now. We're not on an equal footing by virtue of our EU membership any more, we're effectively on our own. Trump will play hardball, and I hope Boris is up to the task. I actually think he basically is (as our recent negotiations with the EU have shown) but at the end of the day the power imbalance will work against us.

We didn't get any 'protection' from the EU. We just had to import and export under their rules, with tariffs set by them. We can now make our own deals instead of having to work under EU restrictions.

Factoring Trump into this is irrelevant. At most, he's only around for another 4.5 years. Trade builds over many years.

The only imbalance is the relative size of our two countries, the size of the economies, and the size of the population. If we only ever traded with people the same size as us, we'd get nowhere. We do masses of trade with countries much smaller than us and masses with bigger countries. Relative size has little to do with it.

We have stuff they want, and vice versa. According to that link, we're the US's seventh biggest trading partner. Considering that we're only the 21st most populous nation in the world, I'd say we're punching well above our weight.

[winkywanky]

We didn't get any 'protection' from the EU. We just had to import and export under their rules, with tariffs set by them. We can now make our own deals instead of having to work under EU restrictions.

Factoring Trump into this is irrelevant. At most, he's only around for another 4.5 years. Trade builds over many years.

The only imbalance is the relative size of our two countries, the size of the economies, and the size of the population. If we only ever traded with people the same size as us, we'd get nowhere. We do masses of trade with countries much smaller than us and masses with bigger countries. Relative size has little to do with it.

We have stuff they want, and vice versa. According to that link, we're the US's seventh biggest trading partner. Considering that we're only the 21st most populous nation in the world, I'd say we're punching well above our weight.

Yes, but the point is that with say chicken or beef from the US, previously we could say 'our hands are tied, these are the (EU) rules'. Now we can't. We have to have the balls to stick up for what WE want. And as is always the case in these matters, not every business/trade case stands on its own merits...ie Trump is liable to say for example, well if you want us to buy such and such off you, then we want you to buy all this chlorine-washed chicken.

Those kinds of situations can and will happen I think.

Lots of opportunity outside the EU now for sure, but equally we must hold our nerve.

And Trump ISN'T irrelevant IMO, immediately coming out of the EU we have several years of having to trade with the US with Trump as President. We need to be trading straight out of the blocks if possible, and Trump will want to be very visibly involved, both for his ego and for keeping folks back in the US happy.

I believe the term is Leverage? Pronounced the American way, of course. And that in itself says it all. They have a lot more Leverage than we do now, around five times as much, if you want to quantify it?

[King Nuts]

Yes, but the point is that with say chicken or beef from the US, previously we could say 'our hands are tied, these are the (EU) rules'. Now we can't. We have to have the balls to stick up for what WE want. And as is always the case in these matters, not every business/trade case stands on its own merits...ie Trump is liable to say for example, well if you want us to buy such and such off you, then we want you to buy all this chlorine-washed chicken.

Those kinds of situations can and will happen I think.

Lots of opportunity outside the EU now for sure, but equally we must hold our nerve.

And Trump ISN'T irrelevant IMO, immediately coming out of the EU we have several years of having to trade with the US with Trump as President. We need to be trading straight out of the blocks if possible, and Trump will want to be very visibly involved, both for his ego and for keeping folks back in the US happy.

I believe the term is Leverage? Pronounced the American way, of course. And that in itself says it all. They have a lot more Leverage than we do now, around five times as much, if you want to quantify it?

I don't know much about the chicken 'n' beef trade, so I don't know whether this chlorine washing thing is bad or not. I know lettuce is chlorine washed and I know salt has chlorine in it, but that's the extent of my knowledge, being a Bear of Little Brain when it comes to science.

Anyway, I trade a lot with the US and Trump has fuck all to do with it. My involvement is more around people moving back and forth, dealing with visas and work arrangements and so on. In other words, it's more about services than it is about goods.

Now if Trump were to say, we'll use all you British guys in whatever the next big Hollywood film is but you have to buy 12,000 chickens from us, I think all parties, with one voice, would tell him to shove it.

End of the day, as consumers, it's our call. We don't have to buy foreign meat and chicken. We don't have to subscribe to Netflix, or go and watch the latest Star Wars film or buy a Cadillac or some Jack Daniels. But we do all those things and the Yanks buy almost as much stuff from us. I think the arrangements work pretty well already, and have done for years. It can only get better from now on.

[winkywanky]

It can only get better from now on.

We have to hope so.

[LLPunting]

If you don't cook a chicken properly there'll always be a risk from campylobacter, salmonella and other stuff too. It's incumbent on the consumer to make sure it gets cooked properly.

The standards of animal provenance are higher in the EU/UK than they are in the US. It's just that in the US they wash the chicken at the end of the process to cure all the ills from earlier in the chain.

I'd rather eat a chicken that had been better looked after and then had to be cooked properly, than eat a chicken that hadn't been looked after as well but just got 'sanitised' at the end.

Our food standards are only as good as the producers of course, nevertheless our standards are higher, and there to be followed.

PS good to see you back Jimmy 

Unless of course we get to eat these chickens: External Link/Members Only

[LLPunting]

I don't think that's an accurate statement of how things are. Have a look at this:

External Link/Members Only

Considering the population of the US is around five times our population, I'd say we're already punching way above our weight in terms of trade with the US.

Those are 2018 figures.

Latest annualised are for 2019, try these External Link/Members Only

Note who else is in our Top 5 trading partners and the balances of trade.

Once we're on our own we want to secure our car industry which means doing a deal with EU because our top export to US is cars!  The US car manufacturers might like Americans to not buy so many cars from abroad and hence us... US/UK trade talks anyone?

Yanks latest trading figures:
External Link/Members Only
External Link/Members Only
We have a trade deficit with them.
Perhaps they'll want to transfer trade from EU to UK where products and services are equivalent but they won't want to pay the same for it (or more) so guess what happens in US/UK trade talks after Brexit...

Population size is irrelevant to trading power it's down to economic power:
External Link/Members Only
Pay particular attention to table where correction is by PPP, Purchasing Power Parity rather than the vagueries of raw exchange rates for USD.

These are projections based on first 3 months of 2020, note caveat that economic figures for months 4-6 will affect them probably negatively even more.
External Link/Members Only

[Boundless]

We don’t exactly have a good record of safety with supermarket chickens, this is from the NHS site in 2014.


Friday 28 November 2014

“More than 70% of fresh chickens being sold in the UK are contaminated,” BBC News reports.

A Food Standards Agency (FSA) investigation found worryingly high levels of contamination with the campylobacter bug, which can cause food poisoning, on chickens being sold across the country. The Guardian reported a food scientist, Professor Tim Lang, calling for a “boycott of supermarket chicken because of 'scandalous' levels of contamination”.

Campylobacter is a type of bacteria thought to be the leading cause of food poisoning in the UK. Eating food contaminated with campylobacter can trigger symptoms such as nausea, vomiting, diarrhoea and stomach cramps.

I've had Campylobacter, it's fucking horrible. I had terrible stomach cramps and the runs for 3 days. Every time I had anything to eat or drink, even water it just went straight through. Had to give a sample to the docs and I got a letter back telling me it was CB as it is classed as a notifiable disease. I have no idea where I got it, the incubation period is from 7 to 14 days which is quite a big window. I def hadn't eaten chicken as I don't like it but had eaten a breakfast at a greasy spoon and also been eating cherries off a tree in the garden, although I washed them. Apparently the bug is prevalent in the intestinal tract of birds and they love cherries.