The "Gig" Economy, Helping or Hindering the Gap?

I feel that a large issue in the current economy is the large gap between the wealthiest and everyone else.  The way this affects taxes is deeply relevant. Wages and income are currently being defined in multiple way.  An example of this is Uber, which the article discusses as having many employees, yet few employees who are receiving what is a real income with benefits.  The risk to government revenue is the large amount of difficulty and cost the contract employee is required to pay is high.

When there is already a gap between the highest and lowest paid workers, adding on a number of workers who are expected to bear the entire burden of taxes the efficiency and equity of the tax decreases dramatically.

To read more about what the "Gig" economy is and how many people are involved in it read more in the New York Times here.

Lady jockey and australian government leave the rest in the dust

The Economist has a quick little article (link here) about the choices made by the Reserve Bank of Australian to not change interest rates, while GDP is below average.  As a result there is call for a change. "Malcolm Turnbull, prime minister of a conservative government, to raise the consumption tax from 10% to 15%. "

Big Pharma looking to Go Green, and not in the way you think.

Pfizer, the very large pharmaceutics supplier in the US is looking to move some of its operations to the land of green, Ireland.  Tax rates for companies are lower across the ocean and since it was discovered as a loop hole in tax code in the 80's many companies have reorganized abroad.  By lower, I mean drastically lower.  In Ireland the company would be paying about 12.5% taxes as a company rather than 35% here.  With a company as large as Pfizer it's a serious way to cut spending.

To hear more about this move, listen or read the story from NPR here.