October 20 that French media said that France has returned to the offensive in the long series surrounding the taxation of US digital giants. After the failure of the negotiations conducted by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development at the beginning of last week, France, which previously suspended taxation to wait for the outcome of the negotiations, decided to impose taxes on digital giants from December this year.
According to a report on the French “Parisian” website on October 18, French Minister of Economy and Finance Bruno Le Maire emphasized in a TV program on the 18th: “Tax taxes on digital giants, together with Spain, Italy and Austria as the first European batch France should be proud of this country.”
According to the report, take Facebook as an example. In 2019, Facebook’s turnover was about 70 billion U.S. dollars (1 U.S. dollar is approximately 6.69 yuan-this website note), but only 8.46 million euros (1 euro is approximately 7.88 yuan-this website note) tax was paid in France paragraph. In 2019, Facebook’s taxes totaled 6.3 billion U.S. dollars, mainly paid in the United States, compared to a very small proportion in France.
However, the OECD has not completely given up, and still intends to reach an agreement on this issue in mid-2021. OECD Secretary-General Angel Guria believes that if there is a complete failure, it will bring about “unilateralist actions and a sharp increase in mutual retaliation measures” and eventually trigger a new “trade war.”
The report pointed out that the economic stakes of this issue are huge. New tax regulations for digital giants can bring nearly US$200 billion in annual tax revenue to governments, and these governments face increasing deficits due to the new crown epidemic. However, the United States will do everything it can to prevent the implementation of the new taxation mechanism.
