Some points that need to be addressed -
That isn't what has happened in countries where there is a low corporation tax. Take for example the Republic of Ireland which has a low Corporation Tax and has attracted large corporations like Microsoft and Google.
Part of the Celtic Tiger has been Ireland's size. There is a direct relationship between the size of a country and its GDP per capita. There are many forces at work here, but one of them is the 'parasitic' effect of drawing trade and industry away from the larger economies, by offering lower tax rates. There are other forces at work, such as better and more flexible government that is able to address local problems. There is also the effect of governments of smaller countries being more accountable to the electorate. Large economies can waste staggering sums in inefficient pensions for public employees, defence spending, prestige and eye-catching public works and are less likely to be called to account.
Wealth creators, largely, create wealth for themselves and squirrel it away in tax havens offshore, making certain that none of the hoi polloi will ever see a penny of it.
Some do and some don't. That effect is usually (but not always) balanced out by rich outsiders coming into a country. The UK is already a tax haven. We have very deliberately set up islands around our shores (IoM, Guernsey, etc.) that are there to service the 'needs' of the very wealthy and we have also given tax-free status to so-called non-doms, who only have to ensure that they are out of the country for over six months. By comparison, Germany taxes non-residents at a flat rate of 30%.
As you also pointed out, their real 'crime' is to spend money on goods that are not local. A new foreign car benefits the local economy by very, very little.
The way to create wealth and grow the economy so that more people share in it is to give money to the poor.
Definitely not! Your heart's in the right place, but a transfer income to the poor is rather like giving food-aid to Somalia. The poor need the means to support themselves, rather than hand-outs that also waste further money by having to be administrated.
if there are a finite number of jobs, there is no real solution.
(Sound of Klaxon horn!) That is to believe in the 'Lump of Labour' fallacy! The amount of work to be done is infinite! Therefore the number of places of work available is also infinite. The problem is that people want well-paid jobs that are easy to do. They all want comfortable jobs in warm offices that pay £40k p.a. and can be done with a degree in Media Studies. At the same time, employers like Aldi are looking for people with a First in Chemistry and able to speak a second language and cannot find them.
A film studio can live on one film a year. That's three months work. But the rest of the year, all the other jobs still need to be done. Roads and buildings need fixing, vehicles need repairing, equipment needs to be maintained, tax returns and all the other office guff needs to be completed - and so on. But ask the HR people at Pinewood what sort of letters asking for jobs come piling in - do they get CVs from carpenters, electricians, road workers, builders, diesel fitters, bookkeepers, legal clerks, roofers and maintenance engineers? Do they hell! Everybody wants to become a $1m-a-gig movie director, but is willing to start off as a cinematographer!
We should be looking at these destitute people and the causes for their poverty. We should be carefully considering the structural changes we need to make to our society to a) lift these people out of poverty and b) prevent others ending up in a similar pickle.
Bingo!
The problem is, there have been no world leaders that are prepared to make those changes. We do not have a Bismark that is prepared to force through massive reforms (in his case the introduction of the welfare state, with free health, education, unemployment and disability payments and all the things that we today take for granted). There are no statesmen out there that can cut through the BS and see the bigger picture.
The complexity of modern life in the UK mitigates against the poor. They cannot afford accountants to find their way through what is possibly the most complex tax system on Earth. They struggle to find their way through the absurdities of parts of the education and health systems and they are confounded and dumbstruck by the benefits and disabilities systems. Every time the poorer in society try for something better, they are offered whatever that is on credit, making their problems even greater.
And every time some Johnny-Come-Lately politician tries to reform something, he or she adds to the complexities and ends up making things worse, rather than better.
But in today's Britain, if you try to introduce simple reforms that have been established throughout the rest of Europe since the War, a great hue and cry goes up. Just say the words 'rent control' and all sorts of people think you are trying to introduce communism. Mention land reform and all hell breaks loose!
Until simple reforms such as those are introduced, until we make it an offence to rent out substandard housing that is not insulated properly, until we force landlords to take only reasonable rents and stop land owners from hording land tax-free, until we start to act like a civilised society in which everybody has a right to decent health care, housing and education, the British economy will remain the basket case that it is.
We now have three classes in Britain, the tax-free rich, the tax-paying middle classes and the destitute. That has to change.
