Biden presidency: change of tone on the GAFA tax
REUTERS
Text by: Myriam Berber
3 min
The French Minister of the Economy, Bruno Le Maire, welcomed this Wednesday, January 20, 2021, the American openness to the GAFA tax project.
During her hearing before American senators, the future Secretary of the Treasury, Janet Yellen, spoke out in favor of an international tax on the digital giants, in total rupture with the Trump administration.
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"An international tax on the digital giants would make it possible to collect a fair share of companies, while reducing the incentives for offshore activities that we certainly do not want to reward,"
future Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen explained to US senators.
The former president of the Fed, the Central Bank was auditioned by senators to confirm her as Secretary of the Treasury.
Janet Yellen's statements mark a real shift in Americans' stance on
GAFA
.
Until now Donald Trump has always strongly opposed it.
The Trump administration had blocked international negotiations for such a tax and
threatened France with retaliation in the form of additional tariffs
on iconic French products like champagne.
Negotiations under the aegis of the OECD
France is giving itself until the summer of 2021 to obtain an agreement with the United States.
It was in July 2019 that France introduced a 3% tax on the turnover of GAFA (Google, Amazon, Facebook, Apple).
In 2019, it brought in nearly 400 million euros.
In 2020, the payment of this tax was suspended to give a chance to international negotiations conducted under the aegis of the OECD, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, to create an international tax.
If discussions fail at the OECD before the summer, France is campaigning for the European Union to set up its own tax.
The President of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen, for her part, believes that the digital giants must be supervised.
But for the moment, the Europeans are putting in place legislation, but in a dispersed order.
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See also: Gafa tax: France sends a summons to the digital giants
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