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How Apple sidestepped a 2013 crackdown on its Irish tax practices

bbc.co.uk

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Re: How Apple sidestepped a 2013 crackdown on its Irish tax practices

#231

Post by macintux »

pathseeker wrote: post #175
visarga wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Reduce that influence and you will have a Govt. that works for the general interests of its people. I recently found out about an old solution that would achieve that goal: Sortition. Instead of having elections every few years, we could randomly pick a hundred people from the population and task them with creating a law. After an initial preparation, they would deliberate like a jury and their decisions would be w…

>1. by random selection, every social category is represented equally No, every social category would be represented similar to their ratio in the rest of society. This wouldn't line up well with many groups that want much stronger support for minorities. Take Native American concerns for example. With just over 1% of the population being Native American they will probably only end up with a few representatives out o…

There's also the point that 100 random people won't have any background on the topic in question. Who's going to help them understand it? Most likely the same vested interests that today lobby the government.

Re: How Apple sidestepped a 2013 crackdown on its Irish tax practices

#232

Post by charlesdm »

toyg wrote: post #229
charlesdm wrote: post #207

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Perhaps this might change after brexit though.

Yes, French and German authorities have made it known that they cannot wait for brexit to happen because it will relieve them of any need to play nice with the UK about shenanigans like these. At the same time, the Irish border problem puts the Republic of Ireland in a similar position of weakness, and they are enemy n.2 for honest tax authorities worldwide. Enemy 3 and 4 (Luxembourg and NL) have also been weakened b…

Maybe. It's likely a UK-EU trade deal will appear before Brexit (in some way or another) and that might not lead to many changes in the end.

Re: How Apple sidestepped a 2013 crackdown on its Irish tax practices

#233

Post by make3 »

donutdan4114 wrote: post #39

The issue with all of these major companies will forever be their "product". --- From: Silicon Valley (HBO) Jack: Richard, I don't think you understand what the product is. The product isn't the platform, and the product isn't your algorithm, either. And it's not even the software. Do you know what Pied Piper's product is, Richard? Richard: Is... Is it me? Jack: Oh God! No! No. How could it possibly be you? You got f…

wtf does this even mean. companies will always care about profitability for their owners. that's the whole point of starting and having a business

Re: How Apple sidestepped a 2013 crackdown on its Irish tax practices

#234

Post by vkou »

abritinthebay wrote: post #132
nautilus12 wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, the spirit of the law is effectively being broken. Sidestepping the law does not constitute following it in my opinion. Laws are meant to be guidelines and legal precedent defines its true extent, you cannot make laws extensive enough to cover every scenario. If they make it illegal to offshore money then apple will simply find a way to establish a corporation on the moon. Its clearly demonstrable that they are g…

> If they make it illegal to offshore money... ... then the US would immediately end up losing all it's multinational companies to less insane countries.

Is Apple going to pack up and move 50,000 people from Cupertino to the Cayman Islands?

Re: How Apple sidestepped a 2013 crackdown on its Irish tax practices

#235

Post by glenstein »

landryraccoon wrote: post #212
glenstein wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Stop Tax Haven Abuse Act would help: https://www.congress.gov/bill/113th-congress/senate-bill/153... Also, as a meta point, since I seem to see these kinds of challenges often: any time a person is put on the spot to name a specific change to a specific provision of law to enact a policy goal, it's probably going to be difficult to immediately give a specific answer. To translate policy into legislation often req…

Won't help against foreign state sanctioned competitors to Apple, e.g. Samsung (Korea) or Huawei (China). I am sure foreign nations would be quite happy to gain any advantage for their own companies over US corporations like Apple. Personally I would prefer that the US maintain a technological advantage for as long as possible.

It also won't make Apple's bezels smaller or write their ad copy for them, because that's simply not among the objectives of any prospective law targeted at reigning in tax havens.

If we need to prop up the U.S. tech sector with special tax handouts because they can't compete, we can do that on a targeted basis when that day comes rather than continuing to perpetuate an open-ended tax giveaway enjoyed by major companies in every sector of the economy.

And in the meantime perhaps we can use the missing revenue to bring our infrastructure up to parity with the rest of the modern world.

Re: How Apple sidestepped a 2013 crackdown on its Irish tax practices

#236

Post by idoh »

nautilus12 wrote: post #127
idoh wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A couple points here: - The US federal government cannot sue someone for not following the spirit of the law. Thankfully. - Per Justice Learned Hand: "Over and over again courts have said that there is nothing sinister in so arranging one's affairs as to keep taxes as low as possible. Everybody does so, rich or poor; and all do right, for nobody owes any public duty to pay more than the law demands: taxes are enforce…

- This is really crazy sounding, but can individual or a group of individuals sue a corporation for what they view as an attempt to sidestep the law in civil court? Since the burden of proof is different in civil court? - Did Justice Learned Hand make this statement with this type of scenario in mind where the amounts of money are on the level of an entire small country? Isn't he just talking about private citizens?…

Replying to your points in order:

- No, in order to sue you must have standing, which in a super short version means that the plaintiff has to be really close to the harm, not a bystander who witnesses something.

- Obviously Apple did not not exist when Justice Hand said that, but I think he would be fine with it. Apple is complying with the letter of the law, and their responsibility on that issue goes no further. Apple is in no way obligated to pay more than what the law requires. If there is a problem with the tax law, then it is up to congress to address that.

- I guess I am less bothered by it than you are. Apple paid what it owed under the law. A lot of corporations pay 0 tax because they are set up as pass-through entities, like S Corps. Is it OK to set up a S Corp for tax reasons?

Re: How Apple sidestepped a 2013 crackdown on its Irish tax practices

#237

Post by kunimu »

fleitz wrote: post #37
fredley wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is not the fault of Capitalism alone. In a healthy democracy, the people vote in the Government, who can impose fines, tariffs, penalties and such on companies and business practices that the people (via the people they elect) deem to be working against them. Sadly, as you point out, this creates a direct incentive to lobby or otherwise attempt to control Government by large and powerful companies. The only way…

The people of Ireland have democracy, perhaps they have different views on taxation than you do. It may come as a surprise to you but some people aren't so greedy as to believe that they are entitled to the fruits of other's labour.

"some people aren't so greedy as to believe that they are entitled to the fruits of other's labour."

There is a distinct and strong sense of unaware irony in this comment.

Re: How Apple sidestepped a 2013 crackdown on its Irish tax practices

#238

Post by no-s »

anigbrowl wrote: post #81
enraged_camel wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>>Consolidated money is power. The only way that capitalism can work long term is if there are rules actively countering/fighting using that power to change the rules. Yes. This is why I'm in favor of term limits, as well as a rule that outlaws "revolving doors"[1]. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Revolving_door_(politics)

That sounds nice, but why don't proponents of term limits ever offer evidence for their claim? We already have term limits in California. The result? Politicians spend a lot of their time in office figuring out how to leapfrog up the political ladder - usually city/county school board, to supervisor, to state assembly, to state senate, to Congress. They are never in one place long enough to build stable networks of i…

Sad but true. In California the legislature is just a tool for the bureaucratic state to pander To itself. Legislators who fulfill the wishes of the state bureaucracy get favorable treatment on the career ladder. I often suggest we should have term limits on laws, not politicians. An absolute sunset on every law and regulation with up/down votes only, no debate, will do a lot to show whether elected public servants are on the job and who they are working for.

Re: How Apple sidestepped a 2013 crackdown on its Irish tax practices

#239

Post by aaron-lebo »

cortesoft wrote: post #203
aaron-lebo wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

governments allow it corrupt governments interfere with it Are those not in opposition? Another solution is a better breed of business that doesn't see $ as the most important thing in the world, but not sure how you change that. Capitalism can and should be a conduit for innovation without outright greed.

They are in opposition in the same way 'we need to drink water to live' and 'don't drown' are in opposition. Just because something is bad at the extremes doesn't mean it is always bad. We need a government that steps in to address the well known issues with unfettered capitalism (externalities, tragedy of the commons, etc).

You're right of course, just not sure whether the poster was saying this was due to government overreach or a lack of government action.

Re: How Apple sidestepped a 2013 crackdown on its Irish tax practices

#240

Post by c517402 »

nautilus12 wrote: post #38
JumpCrisscross wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> we should simply make large corporations like Apple actually follow the existing tax laws Apple is in compliance with our tax laws. The laws, not Apple, are the underlying problem.

No, the spirit of the law is effectively being broken. Sidestepping the law does not constitute following it in my opinion. Laws are meant to be guidelines and legal precedent defines its true extent, you cannot make laws extensive enough to cover every scenario. If they make it illegal to offshore money then apple will simply find a way to establish a corporation on the moon. Its clearly demonstrable that they are g…

A product has its components fabricated in east Asia, is assembled in east Asia, sold in Europe, and the profits from the sale are held in Europe. Somehow you consider this “illegally offshoring money”. Somehow you think the US government deserves 34% of these profits. Apparently, the spirit of the law being violated is that the US government has the right to stick it’s nose in anyplace in the world it wants and extract rent.

At a physics conference Wolfgang Pauli heard a talk that was so misguided that his comment was that “it wasn’t even wrong.” IMO your comment isn’t even wrong.

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