Ignoring that who will enforce it? If say a Russian owes taxes to the US how will they get the payment if the person doesn't want to pay?
But even then why should the taxes go to that country? All the infrastructure to allow your business to operate in the first place is in your country. The roads to get your employees to work etc.
That being said if your going to open factories or offices in another country than I believe you should be required to have a corporation in that country and pay taxes in that country for the revenues those entities make. But even that is challenging. It's honestly a very hard issue to resolve...
Basically all I'm saying is that it's not an easy problem and there are no easy and obvious answers :(
Clearly the tax has to be paid somewhere, and I'll bet every jurisdiction has an argument why theirs is the right place to collect it. No wonder tax or trade treaties take so long to negotiate.
The same justification could be made for accepting international credit card payments online, but companies like Stripe are happy to provide you with a service that takes away the hassle. If they can do that, then I'd say they would be perfectly willing to solve the local tax problem for you.
You seem to be wanting a consumption tax rather than an income tax. This is known by economists to be the least distortionary tax, for the exact reason you argue.
It's also highly criticized by left wing types since it taxes people in proportion to the benefit they receive from society rather than what they produce for society. Typically poor people consume more than they produce, while rich people produce more than they consume.
Large companies that threaten to abandon doing business because state X or country X makes them pay tax? Farewell, we don't need you.
Except that very often, we do. Just look at Austin - as a result of their little feud with Uber/Lyft, they are now providing below sub-developing world level services.
2. The fact that you can "game the system" and remain squarely in the "legal" column makes the system broken.
3. Considering that fines are typically a fraction of what they should be, again the system is broken. Consequences should threaten the ability of a company to remain afloat, not be a slap on the wrist that doesn't even dent the bottom line.
4. You perform business in a country? Pay the taxes for all revenue factually originating in that country, not technically based on loopholes. If revenue originates from a customer/client/subsidiary in country X, you pay taxes in country X; you don't get to have customers in country X, but pretend like your business in country Y really took their money. Simple as that.
5. Exactly this. The fact that it is not intended, but is possible, makes the system broken.
Governments need to crack down on this sort of thing - HARD. The laws need to be rewritten from the ground up, but this will never happen because of another ugly facet of capitalism - at least in the US - lobbying. Also, self-interested politicians - how many of the politicians who could rewrite the laws have their own businesses that are avoiding taxes which implies a conflict of interest? Large companies that threaten to abandon doing business because state X or country X makes them pay tax? Farewell, we don't need you. This also applies to incentives, which some states are famous for. Individual states should not be competing for companies' business by reducing taxes or offering reimbursement programs.