Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Apple must pay 13B euros in back taxes, EU's top court rules

cnbc.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

461–470 of 708 posts

Re: Apple must pay 13B euros in back taxes, EU's top court rules

#461

Post by ajross »

nine_k wrote: post #385
vasco wrote: post #357

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you make it seem like EU doesn't care at all about what member states do in regards to taxation but there's many limitations to what can be done by any member state in order to harmonize and prevent corruption etc. This in practice makes the EU have a lot of say in regards to taxation. Moreover the EU has special rules to limit moving funds to jurisdictions that have taxes that are deemed too low (read tax ha…

Specifically in Ireland, corporate taxes were being lowered from late 1980s until 2003, in a series of agreements with the EU regulators. It's not like Ireland lowered the taxes in a sneaky scheme, or grandfathered-in an abnormally low rate.

At the same time it's clear that Ireland has been "gaming the system" here, and the proof is the huge delta between the effective tax rates between member nations we're seeing in the judgement. I don't know that there's much of a moral or principled argument to be made here, every system gets gamed, and the European Commission is another such system. And Ireland absolutely agreed to be bound in that game as a price of joining the EU in the first place.

Basically, from the other side of the ocean I don't see much to care about here beyond the microtactics of business development decisions. Let Europe sort out its business on its own.

Re: Apple must pay 13B euros in back taxes, EU's top court rules

#462

Post by paulddraper »

andy_ppp wrote: post #51

It would just be really good if companies stopped avoiding tax. Most countries are already pretty much bankrupt - it's worth thinking about for every debt (US National Debt is $35.35 trillion!!) there is a rich person on the end of it with the loan as an asset earning interest. If companies avoid tax and rich people avoid tax it means more tax for normal people who work for a living.

> It would just be really good if companies stopped avoiding tax.

You first :/

Re: Apple must pay 13B euros in back taxes, EU's top court rules

#463

Post by hopsworks »

tpm wrote: post #410
mandibles wrote: post #394

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Seems like Ireland should have to pay the EU

No, it's Ireland's money to collect and keep. The taxes don't go to the EU budget.

Other countries in the EU, however, can sue ireland for taxes they missed out on. Which is probably what will happen. The money will be divided up over many countries.

Re: Apple must pay 13B euros in back taxes, EU's top court rules

#464

Post by paulddraper »

tway_GdBRwW wrote: post #165
Aerroon wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe governments need to stop spending 40-50% of the entire GDP? For example, the US federal government + state governments spend about $10 trillion a year. The US has a GDP of about $25 trillion. And the US isn't exactly known as a high tax country. France is estimated to be at 58%...

Hmm, lots to dig into here. The expectation that government provides certain services... The nature of fiat currencies and what actually makes the USD worth anything or even usable as a medium of exchange... Basic economics. Government spending == business revenue; the money doesn't just vanish.

> the money doesn't just vanish

Of course not.

Laughs in government contractor

Re: Apple must pay 13B euros in back taxes, EU's top court rules

#465

Post by stoobs »

Supernaut wrote: post #277
afiori wrote: post #270

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> their net profits to the Polish exchequer I believe that part of the reason is that they still pay other taxes (eg VAT) in the country of sale.

VAT is a tax paid by the consumer, not the manufacturer. If you buy an iPhone, it's you that pays the VAT on it, not Apple.

VAT is collected by the retailer and paid to the exchequer of the country of sale.

The VAT sum is recorded at the time of sale, but the whole amount sits in the company finances until the VAT is settled with the exchequer.

The company holds the VAT sum between collection and settlement, potentially benefiting from the temporary cash flow in that period.

Re: Apple must pay 13B euros in back taxes, EU's top court rules

#466

Post by paulddraper »

kwhitefoot wrote: post #205
Aerroon wrote: post #193

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The welfare systems (in Europe at least) don't work. They work if you're old right now, but once the young people of today become old they won't get anything meaningful out of it. At least that's the impression I have and everyone else my age has. And healthcare is unavailable anyway. Several month long waits to see a specialist.

So how come the US has worse health outcomes?

43% vs 13% obesity is a theory

Actually, given that, it's kinda remarkable the US life expectancy is only 2 years less.

Re: Apple must pay 13B euros in back taxes, EU's top court rules

#467

Post by vonzepp »

sgu999 wrote: post #441
jajag wrote: post #383

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This is will force a political crisis no it won't > as the government is complaining it has no money to build houses no it isn't

I'm not Irish and I'm a lazy reader at this time so I won't search who's right, but the comment you are answering to was way more convincing than yours.

I'm Irish and the later is more correct. There isn't going to be a major political crisis over this. Irish corporate taxation is to the Irish electorate what the flag is to Americans. It's quasi religious.

The government isn't really blaming lack of money on the housing crisis more they are claiming it takes time.

Re: Apple must pay 13B euros in back taxes, EU's top court rules

#468

Post by jwildeboer »

anonymousDan wrote: post #233

For non-EU readers, note that taxation is explicitly not a competency of the EU (i.e. Ireland can set its tax levels to whatever it wants). The only thing in question here is whether it was applying the same taxation rules to all companies, as granting special exceptions to certain companies could be viewed as state aid (which is not allowed). Ireland claimed it wasn't, the current (over-)ruling says otherwise. This…

It’s a final ruling. Not a current (over-)ruling as you paint it. This is a decision from the European Court of Justice. No appeal possible. The 13B€ are already in an escrow account and will now be released.

Re: Apple must pay 13B euros in back taxes, EU's top court rules

#469

Post by barrkel »

mcny wrote: post #453
jay_kyburz wrote: post #449

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A good argument for GST. With a 10% GST the Italians would have at least seen 10% of the 599.

I apologize if this is a stupid question but aren't GST and VAT (basically) the same thing? It is just an "advanced" sales tax, no? It still does not fix the problem of income tax... The big problem from what I remember from earlier is some companies like grocery stores operate on razor thin margins -- like they buy tomatoes for USD 0.90 per kilogram and sell for USD 1.00 or whatever so if we charge income tax on the…

Value added tax is a tax on the difference between the purchase price of the inputs and the sale price of the outputs; that is, it's a tax on the value that company specifically adds.

The way it works in practice is VAT is added to the the sale price, but the VAT actually sent by the business to the government is reduced by any VAT that was paid for inputs. This way, you don't end up with increasing amounts of tax just because a supply chain has lots of middlemen.

This setup creates an incentive to report VAT at each level of the supply chain, reducing fraud. Because the tax doesn't compound with multiple steps, it's fairer.

Post reply on HN