Facebook $5 billion for that scandal, but the
wider debate of reining in tech companies’
powers has only just begun.
The House Judiciary Committee in the U.S. is
investigating the market power of Facebook,
Google, Amazon and Apple. Congress is this
week holding a two-day hearing on Facebook’s
plan to create a digital currency, Libra, which
governments in the U.S. and Europe have been
skeptical about.
In Europe, one of the big questions is how
to tax these companies, which do huge
business across the continent but pay taxes
only in the EU nation where their local
headquarters are based, often a low-tax
haven like Luxembourg or the Netherlands.
The result is they pay a far lower tax rate
than traditional businesses.
France has tried to address the problem by
unilaterally proposing a 3% tax on big tech
companies’ revenue in the country. The U.S.
government is not happy about that and
finance ministers from the Group of Seven
wealthy countries are discussing the issue this
week in Paris.
Ursula von der Leyen, the newly appointed EU
Commission President who should take up her
role in November, has said the issue will be a
priority for her.
The tax issue has brought Amazon into the
EU’s crosshairs before. Two years ago, officials
ordered it to pay $295 million in back taxes to
Luxembourg after finding that the company
profited from a tax avoidance deal with the tiny
European country.