Coffee chain Starbucks has given in to pressure from United Kingdom lawmakers, campaigners and consumers and has agreed to pay more UK corporation tax, after a public outcry over how little it pays. Starbucks, along with other multinational companies like Google and Amazon, pays very little tax in Britain, despite making substantial sales there.
Managing director of Starbucks UK, Kris Engskov, announced that the company would pay "a significant amount of tax during 2013 and 2014, regardless of whether the company is profitable".The extra taxes could amount to 20 million pounds over the next two years. Starbucks has paid £8.6m in corporation tax in its 14 years of trading in the UK, and for the past three years Starbucks has paid no corporation tax in Britain despite telling investors that the local business was highly profitable, while reporting an actual loss. The company had UK sales of nearly £400m in 2011 but has reported a taxable profit only once in its 15 years of operating in the UK.
So even though Starbucks have done nothing illegal - they have behaved immorally; morals are always subjective, but clearly a lot of their former customers are unhappy with their behaviour and have boycotted their stores. In Chapter six, we all studied Corporate Social Responsibility, and even though they claim to be socially responsible, they haven't done their duty of paying taxes like a good global citizen. Much harm is done in the world by people/organizations behaving legally but immorally.
Trouble brewing over Starbucks' UK taxes
Starbucks has joined the growing roll call of big high street names reportedly paying virtually no tax in the UK
