On 21 March, the European Commission will present the draft of the new European web tax. The text provides for the imposition of a levy on digital multinationals equal to 5% of the turnover generated in the countries of the Union. The project is clear, but its feasibility has yet to be demonstrated: in fact, to enter into force, the tax would have to obtain the go-ahead from all EU governments. And it is foreseeable that several countries will get in the way: above all Ireland, a real tax haven for the giants of Silicon Valley, but also Holland and Luxembourg, which thrive thanks to forms of tax dumping in other sectors. The same goes for Malta and Cyprus.
Last autumn the governments of Italy, France, Germany and Spain had asked the partners and Brussels to introduce a European web tax. Before Christmas the front had expanded to about twenty governments, but unanimity remained a chimera. For this reason, the discussion between governments had stalled and Brussels had been asked to go ahead with a text and then try to bend the resistance of Dublin and its partners.
And so the Commission will present its proposal. Furthermore, according to the intentions of the Community Executive, the European web tax should be nothing more than a transitional solution in view of a global agreement at the OECD level (even more improbable). In the meantime, the EU puts the top 5% on the table.
To date, the giants of the web move taxable profits in a virtual and fictitious way to countries where they are taxed very little. The international tax codes provide that a multinational must pay taxes on profits in a country where it does business and operates if it has a "permanent establishment" in that country, i.e. a certain number of employees, a commercial organization, offices or lines of production. Otherwise you can continue to pay them in your registered and tax office which is usually located in Ireland, Holland or Luxembourg, where the rates are less than half that of us.
For this reason Brussels with a directive introduces the principle of the Digital permanent establishment, a sort of digital residence thanks to which companies with an income exceeding 10 million euros in an EU country and with a number exceeding a certain threshold will pay the European web tax (yet to be established) of users and online contracts.
The European web tax will hit businesses in which the asymmetry between profit taxation and the creation of added value is particularly significant, i.e. companies that monetize user data (Facebook, Google, Twitter, Instagram) and those that connect consumers and service providers (Airbnb or Uber).
Furthermore, for the web tax to be applied, the company must have an annual global income of more than 750 million euros and revenues in Europe of more than 10/20 million (the figure is still under discussion).
