There have long been concerns that the biggest corporations do not pay enough tax in developed nations. Tech giants have been criticised for reporting lower profits in high-tax countries and higher profits in lower-tax jurisdictions to minimise their tax burden. Microsoft has said it will contest a US tax authority’s request to pay an additional $28.9bn (£23.5bn) in back taxes for the years 2004 to 2013. But Microsoft said “the issues raised by the IRS are relevant to the past but not to our current practices”. This year, Microsoft has also come under scrutiny from other US authorities. In June, it agreed to pay $20m to the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) after the company was found to have illegally collected data on children who had started Xbox accounts. Do you think that biggest corporations are denying the governments of the tax revenues and should be forced to pay even the arrears ?
