Paul Ormerod: Corporation tax: fostering the illusions of the electorate that someone else will pay
Updated: 2012-10-31 22:25:14
Corporation tax is very much in the news. Starbucks is merely the latest to be in the
spotlight, having paid no corporation tax on more than £1billion of sales in the past three years This became
noteworthy when the Prime Minister himself declared he was unhappy with the level of tax avoidance by big corporations working in Britain.
The plain fact is that if corporation
tax did not exist, it would be madness to introduce it. The tax plays to the ignorance not only of
the general public, but of almost all politicians. It encourages the fantasy that there is a
free lunch, that someone else will pick up the bill for the welfare state and
bloated state bureaucracy.