This thread (and it being upvoted to the top) is a prime example of why there isn't any Big Tech in EU - because we slam down even fun little startups with this legalese bullshit as soon as they appear.

"legalese bullshit" - you sell a product, you need to handle VAT. Every single business in the EU abides by this, why should a business be exempt just because they're on the internet?

US businesses - afaik - are not required to collect sales tax out of state below a threshold of 100k per year per state. So yeah, the parent comment is valid. A bit of pro-new-business flexibility wouldn't hurt in Europe.

That's not true, there's a rather large minimum until you need to think about VAT. 100k EUR/year where I live.

Not since last year

https://vat-one-stop-shop.ec.europa.eu/index_en

Lol, "simpler and fairer world"? I want some of what these people are smoking.

I'm a VAT payer and it's at minimum 15-20 incredibly complicated accounting forms per year, with harsh penalties for mistakes and missed deadlines. I would never be able to start doing business if I had to do this at the beginning, and I'm in the most lucrative market today - and I would never risk it too, the fines are damn huge.

Doing the forms costs me thousands of euro yearly even though my accounting is totally simple, I have just few invoices per month with just few line items.

As I said, this is why this place is failing business-wise.

I'm in Denmark, which I would not have expected to be the simplest place for taxes, but evidently it must be because I don't have any of these problems you do with VAT, although I only invoice one time per month it's true so maybe that is the difference.

Can you tell me about other countries requiring an impressum? .. I think Switzerland..?

The 24 Unicorns in Germany https://www.failory.com/startups/germany-unicorns

The 20 in 8 times smaller Israel:

https://www.failory.com/startups/israel-unicorns

Yeah lol, 24? With the size of German economy it should be 240 or 2400, definitely not 24. (if it was irony then I'm sorry I didn't recognize it)

you're correct 240 if you say well the American economy is 10 times the size of the German (it's a little over 12 I think) but I wonder if we might see that the rate of German unicorns is growing at about the level it should be in recent years, that is to say the disparity in number of Unicorns is more Germany starting late than anything else.

Aside from that of course the EU has made it relatively clear it does not really want unicorns like Twitter or Facebook. So I mean if you take away PII violating companies from the mix then things might look more equal also - but perhaps that is more of that pesky legalese bullshit you seem to find onerous.

US GDP is between 6 and 8 times Germany .. so should be like around 80-60 unicorns

But then .. you have Israel who has a 10 times smaller economy per GDP size and still managed 17 unicorns ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

yours is probably more accurate than mine, I saw a 2019 estimate said 2 point something trillion and then U.S 24 point something trillion, but I didn't look really close.

hmm, yeah maybe it doesn't matter so much the GDP size - does Israel have a lot of legalese bullshit?

on edit: changed petty regulations to legalese bullshit. Couldn't remember the exact phrase this far down.

It's very funny to speak about privacy while the EU is pushing literal Chat Control at the same time.

I'd much rather have Big Tech and the money it brings home - nobody is forced to use their free services, I'm simply avoiding them - than have Chat Control forced down my throat unless I move to the Land of Free PII Violations.

all i can hear is "if only the whole world was as unregulated as the US"-mimimi

The US is plenty regulated. It's why VCs have to spend absurd sums on lawyers for Uber and Airbnb. Sidestepping laws and regulations isn't cheap.

EU is so backwards with bureaucracy it is actually easier to set up a US entity for a new startup and hire EU devs in it than set up in an EU country and navigate the tax laws of 28 countries.

At least i got health insurance for my problem.

No insurance in the world will cover you when you ask a lawyer to explain the world to you.