Facebook to pay millions of pounds more in UK tax

Do you find it difficult to understand the business section of the news?
We know just how challenging it can be, so, we’re going to try and help you make sense of it all.

In our posts, Word Cloud: Business News Edition, we’ll be looking at some interesting articles from the business section of some prominent publications. We configure word clouds based on the frequency in which the terms appear in the text. The more often you find a particular word in the article, the larger it will appear in the cloud. Finally, we’ll take 20 of these words and define them within the context of the feature.

After studying enough of these high-frequency words, the aim is that you will be able to understand the main idea of more and more business articles, in which you’ll probably encounter similar words.

So, let’s get started!

1. Click on the first line of this post to access a recent article about Facebook.
2. Use the definitions below as a reference to help you understand any elements of the text that might be unclear.

Of course, if there’s something that you need to be defined that’s not listed below, please leave us a comment and we’ll be happy to explain.

Happy reading!

pay
Facebook needs to give money to the government.

changes
Before, Facebook was taxed in Ireland. Now, it will be taxed in the UK. This is something that is different than before.

profits
The money that Facebook earns, after counting what they spend.
Revenue – Expenses = Profits

tax
A charge from the government based on money Facebook makes from its business.

business
1. An organization that sells products or services.
2. A combination of Facebook’s activities that generate revenue.

media
Facebook is in the business of social media. Social media allows people to create and share information on the internet.

advertising
Companies pay Facebook to show specific posts that help sell their products or services. Advertising on Facebook allows a company to target a large number of people.

revenue
The money Facebook makes when a company pays them to advertise.

higher
Now, Facebook will pay 25% in taxes. Before, they were paying 20%. 25 is a larger (higher) number than 20.

sales
The same as revenue. The money Facebook makes when a company pays them to advertise.

new
Something that didn’t exist before. The UK government has created a new tax to punish companies that try to pay less by setting up an entity in other countries. Facebook are also building new offices in London.

structure
The way Facebook is organized in relation to taxes. The structure at the moment includes all advertising revenue to be invoiced from Facebook’s entity in Ireland. They, therefore, pay taxes in Ireland. Now, the structure will change. Revenue will be invoiced from the UK.

after
A preposition meaning that an event is a consequence of another event. First, authorities looked at Facebook’s structure and how they were paying taxes. Then (after), there was a decision made to change this structure which will make them pay taxes in the UK instead of Ireland.

operations
All of the activities that Facebook performs to earn profits.

affairs
Anything having to do with, or related to, their taxes. The way the company is organized affects how much tax they pay. So, company structure is part of Facebook’s tax affairs.

controversy
A widespread debate. People are upset that Facebook and Google do not pay a lot of taxes outside of the UK, even though they do a lot of business in the country. Many people are arguing whether this activity is ethical, whether it should be legal, and if the government should do something.

bill
The amount of money that Facebook needs to pay in taxes.

revealed
1. The fact that Facebook is building a new office in London supports the idea that Britain is very important for the company.
2. Something was communicated to people that they didn’t know before – information about how much Facebook paid in taxes.

staff
A group of people that work for a company. It is another way to say ’employees’.

authority
A tax authority is an organization that enforces tax laws.

The LV Linguistics team loves writing about anything to do with business culture and enjoys finding ways to use this to help readers improve their English skills. In addition to articles related to the corporate world, entrepreneurship, work-life balance, and more, we’re working hard to create and share English vocabulary and grammar exercises that we hope can help you to excel in your language endeavors.

Please let us know if there’s something that you’d like us to write and post! ​