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Apple has €13bn Irish tax bill overturned

bbc.com

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Re: Apple has €13bn Irish tax bill overturned

#271

Post by discreteevent »

MR4D wrote: post #231
axlee wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Workers are also a pretty big beneficiary FANNGS, by definition, are 1% of the Fortune 500. In term of headcount, it's even lower. They should not even be part of this argument. You can't base taxation policies around the personal experience of hyper-specialized, in-demand trained professionals. Fortune 500 no1: Walmart. no2? Amazon. Are you arguing that those kinds of companies have a upward pressure on salaries?…

If I use the S&P 500 instead (easier calculation given available data for me), the the FANG is a huge portion. (Yes, 5 companies out of 500 are by definition 1/100.) No argument about headcount, though. Take a look at the second chart (bottom of "Page 1", the third actual page considering the title page and contents page). [0] Revenue may be small, but profits are huge, and market capitalization (aka "wealth") is abs…

"Most of the low paying jobs have existed for decades in various industries (esp retail), but most of those tech jobs didn't exist 20 years ago."

How many low paying jobs are taken by e.g. a high paying e-commerce job? Hundreds surely. And if there are less low paying jobs you can pay someone less to do them because there are so many people looking for those few jobs.

Re: Apple has €13bn Irish tax bill overturned

#272

Post by throw0101a »

ogre_codes wrote: post #258
m12k wrote: post #20

Transfer pricing and tax havens are draining money out of the economies of most European countries, breaking the virtuous cycle where consumer spending also leads to salaries, taxes and more investment in the community, to keep the economy going - instead we have a shrinking middle class, as the fuel is drained from the engine. Ireland, Luxembourg and certain other countries are complicit in this. We clearly need bet…

> We clearly need better tax laws to combat this, but I'm glad the commission is trying to fight this to the extent they can within current laws, and I hope they win the case on appeal. I fully agree with the former, but—to an extent—disagree with the latter. The thing that bothers me about this lawsuit is the fact that it is in essence an after-the-fact tax increase. If they want to reform tax law, then it should be…

> If they want to reform tax law, then it should be forward facing, not trying to reverse previous established policies.

The EU argument was that Ireland's "previous established policies" were against EU treaty, and so the (alleged) special deal that IE gave Apple should be considered annulled since it was invalid from the day it was signed.

> On this basis, the Commission concluded that the tax rulings issued by Ireland endorsed an artificial allocation of Apple Sales International and Apple Operations Europe's sales profits to their "head offices", where they were not taxed. As a result, the tax rulings enabled Apple to pay substantially less tax than other companies, which is illegal under EU state aid rules.

> This decision does not call into question Ireland's general tax system or its corporate tax rate.

* https://ec.europa.eu/commission/presscorner/detail/en/IP_16_...

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EU_illegal_State_aid_case_agai...

Re: Apple has €13bn Irish tax bill overturned

#273

Post by mdszy »

dang wrote: post #264
mdszy wrote: post #228

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How do corporate boots taste there, bud?

We've banned this account for breaking the site guidelines and ignoring our requests to stop. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

lmao

all 0 requests to stop, just constant downvotes for telling people, rightfully, how much boot they're guzzling

Re: Apple has €13bn Irish tax bill overturned

#274

Post by [deleted] »

majidazimi wrote: post #115
myspy wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

European developers don't need to live in areas though, where they have to pay 2 million dollars for a house and they have social security and health care. This lessens your argument.

I live and work in Munich and I have to pay half a million euros for a 25m^2 box. EU is cheaper than US is a fallacy.

[deleted]

Re: Apple has €13bn Irish tax bill overturned

#275

Post by xyzzyz »

gridlockd wrote: post #247
ChuckNorris89 wrote: post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, but renting doesn't give you that sense of security when you are thinking of having kids versus owning your own place. When you're renting the thought of the landlord kicking you out if the rental market should suddenly shift is a huge axe to child planning for most couples. Owning you own place offers a more secure feeling and belonging to a community.

This is pure make-belief. You should buy if a purchase is cheaper than renting. Guess what, it never is when interest rates are at zero. Rent is determined by what people with jobs can pay, property prices are determined by what international investors with deep pockets and easy credit can pay. Which one are you? If you are the former, you will be paying down a mortgage that you can barely afford. You will be a slave…

property prices are determined by what international investors with deep pockets and easy credit can pay.

The international investors with deep pockets own very, very, very few properties compared to regular people.

What if you lose the ability to pay? How secure is your paycheck really?

What if you lose the ability to pay rent? How does that make you any better off?

Keep your cash, and invest it somewhere else.

I have a mortgage with 75% of the principal left to pay, where the interest on the loan is somewhere between the third and the half of what I'd pay in rent for equivalent property. If I was renting instead of paying mortgage, I wouldn't have any cash to keep to invest elsewhere anyway.

You can find a new place to rent. You can leave if your community turns to shit.

You can also sell your house/condo and move somewhere else, at any time.

Re: Apple has €13bn Irish tax bill overturned

#276

Post by INTPenis »

What could possibly be the motivation to say no to 13bn EUR in tax revenue just to suck up to big corporations like Apple?

To me it stinks of private deals made behind closed doors.

Why else would politicians not give a damn about their own country. As long as their ass is dry.

I just hope the EU don't give up. I actually see hope when the EU is made up of people from all sorts of countries, that even a Danish woman can go up against this corruption. DO NOT GIVE UP.

Re: Apple has €13bn Irish tax bill overturned

#277

Post by alphadevx »

dicomdan wrote: post #178

EU needs to solve this problem at its roots and put pressure on tax Haven states directly. If that necessitates a reform that gives expanded authority to EU so be it.

That is exactly what they shouldn't do. Firstly, what is the agreed definition of a tax haven, and secondly, which countries belong on that naughty list? Thirdly, when many of those countries are EU members with voting and even veto rights to block such reforms, how exactly do you think the EU is going to put pressure on itself?

Re: Apple has €13bn Irish tax bill overturned

#278

Post by markdown »

yashap wrote: post #270

Standard Ireland stuff. They want to bring jobs to Ireland, so they create international corporate tax loopholes. My understanding is these loopholes mostly allow US tech companies to make large real profits in Europe, have them attribute to an Irish office, but then bullshit the profits away by claiming things like paying licensing fees to themselves, for their own tech, paid to a subsidiary in an even sketchier tax…

It's really a form of tyranny how wealthy western nations get to do this, but out here in Fiji, we get hit by shit like [1] despite absolutely NOT being a tax haven in any shape or form.

1. https://www.rnz.co.nz/international/pacific-news/384636/fiji...

Re: Apple has €13bn Irish tax bill overturned

#279

Post by alpha_squared »

macNchz wrote: post #252
alpha_squared wrote: post #234

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> ...instead of what happens in the US were most employees get rich and some of them go on to create beer startups. Do most startup successes (which themselves are quite rare) result in most employees becoming rich? I've had my share of successful startup experience as an employee, and there was a nice payoff, but I'd hardly call it "rich" in any accepted definition of the word. At best, it's made up for the time I s…

I think your experience is likely the most common, but ultimately the "startup ecosystem boosting" effect being discussed really only needs the occasional company to come along and dramatically outperform, creating a couple hundred new startup-minded millionaires who want to invest or create their own companies.

When a company has that sort of exit or IPO that results in a couple hundred new millionaires, it also usually has at least a couple thousand non-millionaires. That still sounds like a far cry from "most" becoming rich.

Re: Apple has €13bn Irish tax bill overturned

#280

Post by tsimionescu »

logicchains wrote: post #38
m12k wrote: post #20

Transfer pricing and tax havens are draining money out of the economies of most European countries, breaking the virtuous cycle where consumer spending also leads to salaries, taxes and more investment in the community, to keep the economy going - instead we have a shrinking middle class, as the fuel is drained from the engine. Ireland, Luxembourg and certain other countries are complicit in this. We clearly need bet…

>Transfer pricing and tax havens are draining money out of the economies of most European countries, breaking the virtuous cycle where consumer spending also leads to salaries, taxes and more investment in the community, to keep the economy going - instead we have a shrinking middle class, as the fuel is drained from the engine. An alternative interpretation is that the high degree of taxes and regulations in Europe…

Would the Irish loop hole not work or the company was European? Sure, maybe it would have been France and Ireland that would have gotten some of the profits instead of The US and Ireland, but the rest of the EU would still be SoL.
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