Maybe ... Just Maybe ... If the U.S. didn't have the highest corporate tax rate in the industrialized world (nearly 30%) there wouldn't be such an economic and financial incentive for Apple (and Amazon and Google) to play these "tax-shell games." You think??
If you don't think those companies would screw anyone or anything for an extra few cents then you have rocks in your head.
Not a "few extra cents" ... but the difference between a U.S. tax rate of nearly 30% and the Irish rate of .005%! It doesn't take a rocket scientist to do the cost vs. benefit analysis on using Ireland for your corporate tax-planning. Moreover, neither Apple, Google or Amazon wrote the Irish tax laws. They just had accountants and tax lawyers who were smart enough to give a big F.U. to the IRS. And, Apple's association with Ireland predates the EU by decades. Now, the EU comes along and the bureaucrats in Brussels are pissed because they see this is as money they can't get their grubby, fat hands on. As for Apple, why should they be penalized for what amounts to perfectly legal tax planning.
As Justice Learned Hand said, "... there is no patriotic duty to increase one's taxes ..."
See:
http://intltax.typepad.com/intltax_blog/2009/07/famous-tax-quotes-4-5.html
