Live data from Hacker News

Apple plans new U.S. campus, to pay $38B in foreign cash taxes

reuters.com

121–130 of 537 posts

Re: Apple plans new U.S. campus, to pay $38B in foreign cash taxes

#121
post #111

I find it fascinating that a tax plan proposed by a President reviled throughout the Valley is the one thing that finally convinced Apple to repatriate much of its overseas cash and invest it here in the US. They of course give no credit to him in this press release, but the proof is in the pudding. Of the many heavy handed ideas and efforts made by the previous administration to convince Apple to do this, exactly 0…

This might be the most brilliant tax plan in the universe. The president wouldn’t be any less revolting because of that. I’m not sure why you are connecting these two ideas. It is true that the partisan extremism of everything leads to people irrationally hating everything someone does (or, as in this case, is loosely associated with), but that doesn’t mean the opposite. This does not and should not wash this revolti…

You are very virtuous and your political opponents are very gross.

Re: Apple plans new U.S. campus, to pay $38B in foreign cash taxes

#122
post #100
post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's very telling that most of the announcements of benefits to workers purportedly attributable to the tax cuts are in the form of one-time bonuses. The corporate tax cuts are ongoing; the bonuses to workers are one-time. These are nothing more than PR moves. Moreover, the headlines are misleading in some cases; for example, Walmart's touted "$1,000 bonus" was actually $200-$1,000 depending on years of service. Only…

> These are nothing more than PR moves. They’re certainly good for PR, and perhaps that’s the primary intention, but employees are benefitting from it.

Right, but imagine if instead, they gave them a raise instead of a one time bonus? That is how you actually benefit workers.

Re: Apple plans new U.S. campus, to pay $38B in foreign cash taxes

#123
post #106

I find it fascinating that a tax plan proposed by a President reviled throughout the Valley is the one thing that finally convinced Apple to repatriate much of its overseas cash and invest it here in the US. They of course give no credit to him in this press release, but the proof is in the pudding. Of the many heavy handed ideas and efforts made by the previous administration to convince Apple to do this, exactly 0…

> the one thing that finally convinced Apple to repatriate much of its overseas cash and invest it here in the US That doesn't really seem too surprising. The previous administration tried to force them to do it, they refused. The current administration gave them what they wanted, they did it. > If other US corporations follow suit with repatriation, the American economy will experience unprecedented corporate reinve…

The repatriation isn’t optional, so you could say the current administration succeeded in forcing them to do it.

Re: Apple plans new U.S. campus, to pay $38B in foreign cash taxes

#124

All the comments seem to be sketpical or negative. I think it's funny if you go back right before tax reform passed and look at all the comments on articles here on HN almost all were blasting tax reform. Saying it won't work, it does not help the economy, does not create jobs, and repatriation only leads to stock buybacks and executive bonuses. So far we've seen company after company giving substantial bonuses to al…

To be fair the bonuses I've heard about have been laughable so far and accompanied by large lay offs in two cases (Walmart and Comcast).

And that's exactly the reason why America thinks that the people who live on the coasts are out of touch elitists.

$1000 is a gigantic bonus for people.

Re: Apple plans new U.S. campus, to pay $38B in foreign cash taxes

#125

I find it fascinating that a tax plan proposed by a President reviled throughout the Valley is the one thing that finally convinced Apple to repatriate much of its overseas cash and invest it here in the US. They of course give no credit to him in this press release, but the proof is in the pudding. Of the many heavy handed ideas and efforts made by the previous administration to convince Apple to do this, exactly 0…

> I find it fascinating that a tax plan proposed by a President reviled throughout the Valley

Not quite. The proposal has been on the table for years. The difference has been how to use the proceeds from repatriation. Republicans wanted lower corporate taxes. Democrats wanted something else. This wasn't new, it wasn't unique, and it wasn't Trump. Believing this was a plan proposed by Trump ignores history and facts. Sure, he signed the bill into law, but the same thing would have effectively happened had Democrats been in charge instead of Republicans.

Re: Apple plans new U.S. campus, to pay $38B in foreign cash taxes

#126
Of course lowering taxes would encourage companies to repatriate large overseas cash hoards, but if that's the only goal, why have a tax at all?

As a country the US has obligations to its current citizens and its future citizens and those obligations cost money. If we overly celebrate these windfalls every time the tax rate is lowered, we might not realize that what we owe the citizen is being forgot and allowed to erode because the means to pay for it just aren't available.

Re: Apple plans new U.S. campus, to pay $38B in foreign cash taxes

#127
post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> a tax plan proposed by a President The corporate tax changes weren't his idea - they have been kicking around Capitol Hill with more or less bipartisan support for years, and it almost happened while Obama was president. The full package of changes wound up being highly politicized and controversial, but the corporate changes were always seen as very likely to pass sooner or later.

They may have been kicked around the Capitol Hill for years but while (D)s had control of the presidency it did not happen. There was a time when (D)s had control of Congress, Senate and Presidency with Obama as a President and it did not happen. To claim this tax cut is a result of bipartisan legislation is rather odd. [Edit] It must be really painful to downvote reality.

They only claim bipartisan responsibility when the tax plan seems to do good for the country (billions of dollars in new investments, tax revenue, repatriation etc.)

Re: Apple plans new U.S. campus, to pay $38B in foreign cash taxes

#128
post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To be fair the bonuses I've heard about have been laughable so far and accompanied by large lay offs in two cases (Walmart and Comcast).

$1,000 is not laughable to most people.

$1000 is better PR than any advertising they could have spent, but it's not even a crumb in terms of what the company is saving.

Re: Apple plans new U.S. campus, to pay $38B in foreign cash taxes

#129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I find it fascinating that a tax plan proposed by a President reviled throughout the Valley is the one thing that finally convinced Apple to repatriate much of its overseas cash and invest it here in the US. Why is that fascinating? It's the tax holiday the tech megacorps have been asking for since the last one in 2004.

And yet nobody gave it to them until now, which resulted in trillions of dollars that should have been benefitting the US economy sitting unused in places like Ireland.

You do know that the money isn't literally sitting overseas right? It is invested (Apple would be the largest bond fund in the world [1] if they accepted outside money). So they'll sell the investments, pay a little tax and then probably do a massive buy back of their shares and a special dividend. A little switching around on paper, but certainly not a stimulus of any sort.

[1] https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-05-04/apple-buy...

Re: Apple plans new U.S. campus, to pay $38B in foreign cash taxes

#130

I find it fascinating that a tax plan proposed by a President reviled throughout the Valley is the one thing that finally convinced Apple to repatriate much of its overseas cash and invest it here in the US. They of course give no credit to him in this press release, but the proof is in the pudding. Of the many heavy handed ideas and efforts made by the previous administration to convince Apple to do this, exactly 0…

Any rational skeptic was couching their criticism that this was net loss for taxpayers, not a total loss. While Apple and others can publicly crow about new investment and jobs and give the president and GOP a PR coup in terms of their bill, you have to consider how much they were paid to do this. The dynamic score said that of the $1.5T in lost revenue, we will likely recoup about a third in new revenue. This will be a sizable amount of stimulus especially for companies like Apple that have enormous profits. If Apple are investing $30B in new capital, it's probably because they are being handed twice that much in tax breaks.
Post reply on HN