It's a nice feeling when your president and government actually work for you! Hats off to the American voter.
Apple plans new U.S. campus, to pay $38B in foreign cash taxes
381–390 of 537 posts
Re: Apple plans new U.S. campus, to pay $38B in foreign cash taxes
#382Earlier quoted context omitted.
> I've heard about have been laughable so far Having been poor, then living on $750/month in US for many years, a $1000 bonus is not life changing but also not laughable. The companies certainly didn't have to give those and could have pocketed all of it. > large lay offs in two cases (Walmart and Comcast). Are those because of the tax incentives?
> a $1000 bonus For 20+ year employees. At 10 years the bonus was, IIRC, $190. IMHO, "laughable".
Walmart is not the only company which did this. Other companies raised their minimum wages and also gave $1000 or $2500 bonuses (Apple did that too I think). Why not be happy for them they got something for the holidays.
Sure we are all software developers expecting 6 figure salaries, RSUs, options and $50k bonuses every year, $1000 is nothing, I get it. Though someone working at an AT&T store in Columbus, OH or Kansas would be quite happy to get $1000. it's disappointing and I'd wish they all had large salaries and thought $1000 is insulting just like we do.
In general we would rather have free healthcare, and other things we like to talk about here, but those probably are not going to happen in this country at his point in time. But why not be happy for these people at least or say that it is nice for Apple to pay some taxes and invest in US as opposed to stashing it away for another 20 years.
Re: Apple plans new U.S. campus, to pay $38B in foreign cash taxes
#383Earlier quoted context omitted.
That doesn’t make any sense though. Why would Apple just create millions of jobs that they don’t require? This is the key mistake people make when they say that tax cuts will create jobs, or minimum wages will cost employment. Companies try to be efficient, and therefore don’t create jobs they don’t need, and don’t get rid of jobs they do need if wages go up. That’s why there is pretty much zero statistical correlati…
Exactly right. Why would a for-profit company work to improve the lives of the population that birthed them? I'm merely making the point that we can do better than this.
I think companies should pay their fair share of tax, comply with stringent labour, environmental and other regulations (high minimum wage, decent holidays, humane limits on work hours per week etc.), even donating part of their profits to charity would be cool.
But you can’t expect companies to randomly create new jobs just for the sake of making jobs (because they have a bit of spare cash)... It just doesn’t make sense.
Re: Apple plans new U.S. campus, to pay $38B in foreign cash taxes
#384Earlier quoted context omitted.
> I've heard about have been laughable so far Having been poor, then living on $750/month in US for many years, a $1000 bonus is not life changing but also not laughable. The companies certainly didn't have to give those and could have pocketed all of it. > large lay offs in two cases (Walmart and Comcast). Are those because of the tax incentives?
> Are those because of the tax incentives? Decreasing taxes on retained profits increases the incentive to cut any activity that is a short term loss rather than trying to turn it around. Because business expenses are deductible from corporate “income” taxes, they are functionally retained profits taxes. So, yes, the tax cuts incentivized the layoffs.
Would it work to argue that increasing taxes also is an incentive for layoffs? Higher taxes, means lower profit margins, means some product lines become unsustainable so departments are closed and people are laid off.
So lower taxes means people are laid off, higher taxes means they are laid off. What tax structure would give them an incentive _not_ to lay people off?
They are basically closing off 60 Sam's Clubs. When is the last time you went to Sam's Club? Do you know anyone who goes there regularly? I don't. I had membership many years ago. Many will be converted to e-distribution centers. Guessing this has little to do with taxes and more to do with new year reorg to compete with Amazon. Otherwise, what would you do? What kind of incentives would you give to Walmart to save those Sam's Club workers?
Re: Apple plans new U.S. campus, to pay $38B in foreign cash taxes
#385Earlier quoted context omitted.
> I've heard about have been laughable so far Having been poor, then living on $750/month in US for many years, a $1000 bonus is not life changing but also not laughable. The companies certainly didn't have to give those and could have pocketed all of it. > large lay offs in two cases (Walmart and Comcast). Are those because of the tax incentives?
> Having been poor, then living on $750/month in US for many years, a $1000 bonus is not life changing but also not laughable. But for rich and poor alike, a layoff is definitely life-changing....
> But for rich and poor alike, a layoff is definitely life-changing....
Agree there, no doubt, most people would rather have a job than a $1000 bonus. But what does that mean in this context? Should Walmart keep those 60 Sam's Club stores open at a loss to avoid laying people off? Should the government subsidize them? Maybe it should break apart Amazon because a lot of those location will become e-distribution centers.
What would you have done. How would you have saved those Sam's Clubs workers? I am curious, not being sarcastic or tricky? I'd suggest breaking Amazon into regional companies like they did with AT&T. Or maybe breaking AWS away from Amazon-retail business.
Re: Apple plans new U.S. campus, to pay $38B in foreign cash taxes
#386This discussion is missing context. The whole reason that Apple has to pay taxes on foreign income is because unlike almost every other developed nation the US has a worldwide tax system. Almost every other nation has a territorial tax system. The rest of the world with their territorial system taxes income earned within that country, the US rather taxes income worldwide, regardless of where it is earned. For example…
They will still be taxed on foreign profits. It's the global minimum tax of 11%. So if they are based in Ireland they'd pay 2% in Ireland and 9% to America. If in China, they'll pay 15% in China and 0% in America.
Regardless of this, stopping the flow of capital and investment into the country with a 35% tax is extremely dumb. Everyone will say effective is far less, but it's far less because of foreign profits and IP stashed in Ireland and effective may be 20% for tech, but marginal to bring back in the states is still 35%
Re: Apple plans new U.S. campus, to pay $38B in foreign cash taxes
#387Earlier quoted context omitted.
> The whole point is that earned income should not have to be repatriated to be taxed. Agree. They used the double Irish paying basically no income tax there. Then were trying to move to Jersey (the island). This isn't new though and other companies were doing it. Is there any realistic short term hope that we'll finally close all the loopholes and the Apples and Googles of this country will start paying their fair s…
My guess is that the path outside of the legislature doing anything is through the courts. Since corporations are citizens there must be some kind of constitutional law since human citizens don’t get the same benefit.
I haven't thought of the courts. It might be interesting to see what would happen. Fighting with a hundred billion dollar company in court is tough though. The have infinite legal resources basically.
And yeah, I see the point about it being considered a person but that is mostly what is called "legal fiction" (it is actually a technical term, not just me being silly https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Legal_fiction). And that only goes so far. Mostly to benefit the corporate entity not the society. I'd like to put some companies in prison for life for destroying the environment or poisoning its workers but it just won't work. It would be nice to see how far it would go though.
Re: Apple plans new U.S. campus, to pay $38B in foreign cash taxes
#388Earlier quoted context omitted.
Can this be challenged in a court? Let them pay 15% and then fine them with another 25% for trying to dodge?
What are they dodging? They're paying a reasonable tax rate of 23%, as opposed to never repatriating the profits and paying 0%. The US govt gave them a chance to clean the slate at a reasonable rate and they took it.
How did you calculate 23%? I was calculating 15%. So a local S-Corp which saves $1M pays more than what Apple pays? How is this fair?
Re: Apple plans new U.S. campus, to pay $38B in foreign cash taxes
#389Earlier quoted context omitted.
You only get the full $1000 if you worked for Walmart full time for 20 years. It’s not like you would still get much if you were a typical Walmart employee.
Walmart is not the only company which gave bonuses. AT&T did the same. Apple gave employees $2500. Overall that is a quite a bit of people who got something they probably would not have gotten otherwise. Yeah, it would be nice to have free healthcare, basic income other things. But to someone making minimum age $1000 is a nice holiday gift. Why not be happy for them?
I'm pretty sure no one who was making minimum wage got a $1000 bonus (including at Walmart, who would be making min wage after being there for 20 years? Sounds like a store manager or district sup to me). So I'm not happy for them because they don't exist.
Re: Apple plans new U.S. campus, to pay $38B in foreign cash taxes
#390Earlier quoted context omitted.
Ok, last one. :) You've really just made a mockery of the ideology of competition haven't you? In fact, that is what corporations do. There's an awful lot of highly concentrated market power lying around for exactly that reason.
Would you please not use HN for ideological battle? At the point this stuff gets generic, it gets predictable, and therefore boring in HN's sense of the word.
My apologies dang. I try to at least be on topic, and this is what has been intensely interesting to me in the past year. Thanks for moderating.