Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire EU rules that Ireland gave Apple illegal state aid - Apple owes $14.5B in taxes

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

Actually, that is 1/2 of 100th of a percent.

TOTALLY INCORRECT. Apple has had a real, bricks-n-mortar presence in Ireland going back decades ... to the late 80's or early 90's I believe. And, currently they employ approximately 6,000 people in Ireland. This more of an issue about whether Brussels or the member EU states have the ability to control taxing policies.

Since the Irish want to separate from Great Britain to stay in the EU they can abide with EU decisions.

Stuff them, the best are moving here anyway.

So if you had been doing business with & in Ireland and Ireland gave you a big tax break for doing business with them...then all of a sudden the EU tells YOU that you owe THEM more money in the form of taxes, you'd be good with that? Is Ireland still part of England/Great Britain? Sour grapes about the Brexit vote??? Legal EU extortion?

JSTUART...you do realize that this won't cost Apple anything right? You do know who is gonna end up paying right???

Apple won't pay jack...the little fella will get it in the arse again as always.

The part I have a real problem with is;



That is private property, owned and payed for by working stiffs.

Ireland has been completely separate from Great Britain since 1948, brexit has nothing to do with Ireland.

What we're seeing is the fallout from handing part of your sovereignty over to an intergovernmental organization. Whether anyone agrees with Ireland's tax deal with Apple or not, the fact is that it's a sovereign nation that has the right to set it's own tax policies. There's nothing illegal about Apple locating there to save taxes.

The EU's trying to meddle in Ireland's internal affairs should send up warning flags over our interactions with the United Nations, especially with regard to the second amendment. Obama would certainly like nothing more than to enter into treaties with the UN that could set us up for a legal showdown since the UN considers the second amendment to be abhorrent.

Apple's not going to turn off anyone's Iphone or Ipad. They're in business to make money and destroying your entire business while attempting to give the finger to the EU isn't a good way to make money.

Not sure what you mean "about the "model" of an unelected, all seeing, all knowing govermental entity telling another country how to run their business".

The EU Commissioners are appointed by their respective governments to represent them. These Commissioners are NOT unelected, all seeing, all knowing governmental entities, but are appointed by their governments to represent their nation. Please explain.

Yes, Apple does have a presence in Ireland, but not the corporate presence that is actually physically headquartered in Ireland. Sales and distribution offices, yes, but not corporate offices that pay taxes.

The Catholic portion of Ireland separated from Britain in 1921 (Republic of Ireland), while the Protestant Northern Ireland remained with Britain. Not sure what your are inferring.

Bing, Bing, Bing!! Absolutely correct!!!!!

WRONG AGAIN. Look. I am not going to give you a free course on international taxation of intellectual property for multi-national companies. Do some basic research on the concept of "Double Irish" or "Double Dutch" tax structures with respect to the licensing and taxation of intellectual property. Call them "tax loop-holes" if you want, but the way US, Irish and off shore tax rules are written, what Apple, Adobe, IBM, Pfizer, and other multi-national companies do with respect to the licensing of IP and conducting foreign sales to minimize or even eliminate taxes is perfectly legal. And, as to the income or profits attributable to the Irish subsidiary company (that is a tax resident of Ireland) it is taxed at 12.5% on the sum that remains after paying the royalty payments to a related off shore entity established in a no tax jurisdiction, all of which royalty payments are tax-deductible for determining taxes to be paid under Irish law.

If you don't like all those various tax laws ... have at it re-writing them. That is why I suggested that our US Tax Code be simply modified to reduce corporate taxes, so that US multi-national companies do not have to result to "pretzel-logic" tax structures to avoid what amounts to confiscatory taxes.

Older thread but thought this may have some interest.


Apple Plans to Repatriate Billions to the United States
Added: Saturday, September 3rd, 2016

Here.

Apple is going to repatriate offshore profits to the US in 2017 through paying billions of dollars in deferred taxes to the US Treasury. Tom Cook provided a summary of Apple’s 2014 tax affairs, citing the Irish and US taxes as $400m each. He provisioned several billion for the US for payment as soon as Apple repatriated. However, this revelation came as a surprise due to Apple’s previous refusal to countenance such a move.




Apple is no different from many US multinationals, who have for decades been pooling their non-US profits outside of the US. Exploiting loopholes in the tax laws, tech giants can defer US taxes continually so long as income is not repatriated to the US. Apple’s cash held offshore is $214.8bn, which is the largest of any American company.

Apple was recently accused by the European Commission of receiving state aid from Ireland, and immediately took a decision to repatriate foreign profits. The European regulators claimed that Apple’s Irish-registered companies were allowed to pass billions of income untaxed. However, both Apple and Ireland have denied any wrongdoing and promised to appeal against the decision. In response, some American politicians called it a political attack.

Previously, Tim Cook had consistently said he would not repatriate Apple profits to the United States until it decreases the US tax rate, because today it would cost him 40% to bring it home, which is clearly not a reasonable thing. The matter is that Apple makes large provisions for US taxes in its annual report, which allows the company to claim that it has an effective tax rate of 26% – this is much higher than many other tech firms.

However, behind these accounting provisions Apple has made clear it is not going to repatriate profits and really pay these taxes while the current tax rate is maintained that high. In other words, its reported tax rate is just an accounting fiction.

A federal tax rate in the United States is 35% on corporate profits and is regarded one of the highest in the world. Moreover, businesses can also end up paying an additional 5% in local state taxes on top of it. In reality, loopholes in the country’s tax code allow US tech giants to aggressively defer tax payments until any income earned outside the country is kept offshore. This is how many multinationals achieve some of the lowest effective tax rates ever.

These corporate giants want all the protections under Corporate Personhood, and yet want none of the responsibilities... Screw-them!

Phil

Same stuff happens in the US all the time with city/states competing for big companies. All kinds of tax and environmental breaks some with durations attached. As soon and the duration's up, they're off to a new spot.

And, Ireland too is bankrupt following their disastrous foray into the world of ruinous banking and real estate speculation. The Irish Government debt (to the EU) is 123% of the GDP.

This is one reason that Ireland gave Apple and others very favorable tax status (0.05% vs. the normal corporate rate of 15%). Apple's corporate presence has no employees or facilities in Ireland, hence costs the Irish nothing so a very small tax rate generates revenues with not costs - good deal for Apple and Ireland - Bad deal for other nations.

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Calhoun I guess you haven't been paying attention to what the current Gov't has been doing with selected Co.'s in the USA. Cheers NC

That would be wrong...

http://www.independent.ie/business/...an-workforce-based-in-cork-30487720.html

From the New York Times "The arrangements enabled Apple to funnel profit from two Irish subsidiaries to a “head office” with “no employees, no premises, no real activities,” the commission said. see: http://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/31/technology/apple-tax-eu-ireland.html?_r=0

I guess Delaware is glad they never joined the EU.