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Do you think the so-called “Panama Papers”— documents that have shed light on how the world's rich and powerful use offshore companies to stash their assets — is a big deal?

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Of course it is a big deal. The lie that we are all in it together after the GFC of 2008 is exposed. The workers and the poor are paying the taxes for fewer and worse services while the rich are getting off scot free. It is widely reported on the net that if Japanese companies and the rich paid their taxes then there would be no need for increases in consumption tax, which is a totally regressive tax as it is. Yet the TV stations, including NHK, don't seem to want to touch this and confine their limited to coverage to what Xi, Putin and Cameron are up to.

14 ( +15 / -1 )

Yes It is pure criminal. It is cheating the your country and it citizens. If these paper show Sports person cheating using drug, their name would be publish and ridiculed rights away plus they would have to front the public to explain their action. Only one of person have came forward to apologise for cheating their Country and and Country man. The rest to these people refuse to see that they have did anything wrong while being caught their hands in the cookie jar right up to their armpits.

10 ( +11 / -1 )

To be fair the news had named names of the Japanese companies that had been listed, just that they still haven't found anything to tie them with anything incriminating. To my knowledge they still have not found any Japanese politicians involved so it hasn't been in the spotlight that much.

It's a shame the minority parties are not tying these with the consumption tax hike though. I guess the people has to stand first since both sides are secretly for hiking up the consumption tax.

1 ( +1 / -0 )

Like Moonraker said, it's huge. It's also complicated, and the public tends to not pay attention to complicated stories.

In order for justice to be done, what we really need is for a news provider to actually provide some detailed news and analysis, but in a manner that's digestable to a public that has stuff to get done. That's going to require some research and investigation and expert background knowledge though, which is way more involved than many news agencies want to get these days.

So expect most sites to just repost what little analysis we have in whatever its current unclear state is and leave it to its users to figure out what it means. Because most users don't have enough knowledge to sort it out in detail, they'll probably decide based on if they are more pro- or anti- establishment. Which means we'll get flame wars, which drives up page-refreshes, which drives up ad revenue, which drives up site profitability.

0 ( +1 / -1 )

I'm more worried about how government spends the tax revenue it does get than the tax revenue that it doesn't.

But how many of us don't have some financial assets outside of Japan somewhere, like back in your country of birth? There is nothing wrong with this per se.

-2 ( +2 / -4 )

If this has "shed light" for anyone except for the young, then it's better just to keep your head in the sand because nothing will come of it since the gatekeepers are using against each other. It is NOT from Wikileaks, but from a Soros funded agency.

-5 ( +0 / -5 )

What a dumb question. The 1% paying no tax, so called leaders of countries that crack down on tax evasion and welfare "cheats" all the while stashing their fortunes away from the tax man and you ask is it a big deal?

7 ( +8 / -1 )

It's all a con. One group of Oligarchs trying to rat out the other.

We are so screwed, so far down the rabbit hole of unfixable economic destruction that the elites are beginning to fight among themselves.

Think ANY OF THEM give a rats behind about nearly broke commenters on JT?

5 ( +6 / -1 )

There is nothing illegal per se about having money in an overseas jurisdiction, it's only if tax has not been paid where due that it is a problem. We need to clearly distinguish between money offshore and taxes due but not paid on it.

The best way for consumption tax hikes to be taken off the table is for government to stop spending money like crazy, but they don't want to do that.

At least the people with huge assets offshore are probably rich and therefore paying a lot of consumption tax every time they buy a luxury car or what have you. The rich can't avoid paying consumption tax on their purchases, so far as I know.

-5 ( +0 / -5 )

There is nothing illegal in holding assets in a low or no tax country. None. If you're an American, it's in the decision by Judge Learned Hand. He ruled that there is no patriotic duty to increase your taxes, and you have a legal right and obligation to arrange your affairs to pay the least tax.

-1 ( +2 / -3 )

@trouble

There is nothing illegal in holding assets in a low or no tax country. None. If you're an American, it's in the decision by Judge Learned Hand. He ruled that there is no patriotic duty to increase your taxes, and you have a legal right and obligation to arrange your affairs to pay the least tax.

And chances are that "Judge Learned Hand" is probably on one of these lists.

If you earn income in a specific country, then you should pay tax in that country. That's true for everyone. You make use of that country's assets, so why don't you pay for them? Of course, once paid, there's no problem doing whatever you want with what is left but that greedy bunch of fat cats (it's a popular term in the UK - the US prefers the one-percenters) should not be allowed to funnel their ill-booten gotty offshore.

That goes for corporates too.

2 ( +2 / -0 )

troubleAPR. 18, 2016 - 10:50PM JST There is nothing illegal in holding assets in a low or no tax country. None. If you're an American, it's in the decision by Judge Learned Hand. He ruled that there is no patriotic duty to increase your taxes, and you have a legal right and obligation to arrange your affairs to pay the least tax.

If that were true, we'd not have people going to jail for tax fraud, nor would it be necessary for for these people to create dummy companies to conceal their identity.

But hey, it looks like I'm proved right about one thing: people are already deciding their opinions about this case based on whether or not they feel like they resemble the people in the story, not by whether or not the actions taken by those people are actually illegal or not. Hooray for a press that agitates but does not inform the public!

2 ( +3 / -1 )

If you if not paying your share of the tax burden and have you assets in some bloke secret pig bank under some proxy accounting firm name then your a Maggot. These filfy lowlife carpetbags are robbing you, your children and grand children. All of them should be deny the right that goes with being a citizen of their country. I would bar them from owning any property in their Companies name, their relatives and their own name. I would bar them and any of their relatives from working in any capacity in their country and I would revoke all licences issued in their Company names, their names and their relatives names. If they are willing to give up 75% of their wealth back to their country then only then they should have their citizens rights back.

1 ( +2 / -1 )

mistie710,

So you are OK with fat cats / one-percenters keeping their money offshore, so long as they pay tax to the country of their residence, right?

Just because someone is a fat cat or a one-percenter does not necessarily mean they are not paying tax, nor did they necessarily get their wealth through evil means. If Mark Zuckerberg has made billions by building up Facebook, pays his taxes, then who cares if his money is on or offshore?

katsu78,

Do law-abiding people not have a right to their own privacy? Or are the law-abiding collateral damage for a crackdown by spend-thrift governments who need to pillage more money so they can buy votes?

John-San,

If you if not paying your share of the tax burden and have you assets in some bloke secret pig bank under some proxy accounting firm name then your a Maggot.

Fair statement.

That certainly doesn't apply to everyone who keeps some money safely overseas though. And it's the government racking up huge debts that robs us and our kids and grand children. And it's the voters of today who are permitting governments to do this. The voters have a lot to answer for.

-5 ( +0 / -5 )

katsu78, Do law-abiding people not have a right to their own privacy? Or are the law-abiding collateral damage for a crackdown by spend-thrift governments who need to pillage more money so they can buy votes?

No, not when it comes to reporting your income. The law says you have to report your income, that means by definition you don't have the right to lie about who you are in order to hide it. I'm completely law-abiding, and you can bet if I lied about who I was to conceal money from the government I'd be in deep trouble. The only difference is I don't have the millions of dollars needed to lie about it in the way that rich people have just decided is okay.

1 ( +3 / -2 )

Japan has TONS of tax cheating companies & they don't need Panama as the govt here ALLOWS them to get away without paying taxes.

About 70% of ALL J-companies have consistently paid little or NO income taxes for decades running & the govt here does NOTHING! The govt is content that their companies employees pay income tax but the companies themselves consistently juggle their numbers so as to show no profit

Who needs Panama when your own govt will simply let you get away without paying taxes!!!

1 ( +2 / -1 )

katsu78,

I take that as as yes that law abiding people who value their privacy are collateral damage.

GW,

Companies don't pay tax in Japan's crappy economy because they can't make any profits to pay tax on, after salaries to workers have been paid. The employees pay income tax because they made income, but besides providing jobs companies can't pay tax if they make no profits lest they go bankrupt. (More bankruptcies might be a good thing in Japan but that is another story)

-1 ( +0 / -1 )

fxgaiAPR. 19, 2016 - 09:24PM JST I take that as as yes that law abiding people who value their privacy are collateral damage.

You're welcome to take what I said to mean something completely different from the words I wrote down if that's your druthers, but one has to wonder why you even bother having conversations in the first place if you're going to make up what you want to hear instead of listening to what the other person actually said.

0 ( +1 / -1 )

I don't know exactly what you are thinking then, because if you are an honest person and report your income to the tax agency, I guarantee you that they will happily tax you on any income that you report to them.

That income may have been earned in cash, or from some offshore sources to which the tax agency does not have readily available information about.

But if the honest person reports their income, that's fine, isn't it?

I don't see that it is necessary to strip away the financial privacy of innocent, honest people, who pay taxes.

0 ( +0 / -0 )

California has one of the highest taxes. It simply makes businesses flee or want to flee. Why should any business be forced to pay super high taxes? They are nearly always employing people who then pay income taxes. Some companies have thousands of employees. Or, as in Walmart's case - 2 million. And yet the government which also wants to grow and grow is not grateful. The more money they get, they more taxes they think up. At one point in the US - prior to 1913, there were no income taxes. The government has become a curse.

-2 ( +0 / -2 )

@fxgai

So you are OK with fat cats / one-percenters keeping their money offshore, so long as they pay tax to the country of their residence, right?

Read back what I wrote. As long as they have paid up what they owe, I have no problem with what they do with their money.

0 ( +0 / -0 )

They're a big deal mainly for the fact that they brought to light an apparently common tax dodge.

0 ( +0 / -0 )

It's a big, yet unsurprising, deal. Even the existence of the "rich" and "powerful" is pretty much enough to simply know how unfair the world is.

0 ( +0 / -0 )

Only Putin and Russian Cello players use the Panama tax dodge it seems. So from the media's perspective the Panama Tax Dodge does not effect anyone except specific Russians. -And I thought (most) Russians used Cyprus as a medium to transfer money. ---> Once again the media has proved me wrong.

0 ( +0 / -0 )

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