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

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

#531

Post by ars »

vasco wrote: post #517
jrnx wrote: post #498

Earlier quoted context omitted.

you're ignoring the 20% VAT on those 3bn sales, which provided 600m tax revenue. Why is it so important that they paid 7m in corporate tax instead of any other amount? Their business apparently has high cost of sales (like stores, personnel etc.), where by the way also taxes occur, e.g. for wages... So I suggest to think twice if you want to paint the picture that Starbucks does not contribute it's fair share to taxe…

VAT is paid by the consumer, not the business. The business merely collects it in behalf of the tax office. Starbucks contributes 0 taxes by collecting VAT. Look up the definition of consumption taxes as opposed to corporate income taxes. If you want to give other examples of ways companies contribute you can mention property taxes on owned properties, or jobs created which usually also have some part of pension etc…

Corporate tax is also paid by the consumer. They raise prices by exactly the amount of their corporate tax.

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

#532

Post by [deleted] »

benoau wrote: post #505
martinald wrote: post #502

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just to be clear - I don't think many people have (much) of a problem with ireland's "headline" 12.5% CT rate. The problem is the selective tax rates that Ireland gave to many multinationals, often as low as 0.005% (effectively in return for ensuring x amount of jobs were created in Ireland). I think these are really very much sneaky schemes.

Corruption with a twist: the government is the one who got the kickback.

[deleted]

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

#533

Post by tomcam »

vasco wrote: post #357
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…

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…

> I think you make it seem like EU doesn't care at all about what member states do in regards to taxation

Did GP change the original text? The closest match I can find to your assertion is where they said "or non-EU readers, note that taxation is explicitly not a competency of the EU"

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

#534

Post by burlesona »

jandrewrogers wrote: post #366
hayd wrote: post #296

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Expats aren’t double taxed but you need to file tax returns to offset taxable income that’s already been taxed. There are specific agreements to avoid double taxation but it’s unclear/unlikely the IRS are just going to hand back money Apple already paid (it likely falls outside of what’s required in those international agreements). Companies, and people, make decisions based on the tax laws of the day eg deciding to…

> Expats aren’t double taxed but you need to file tax returns to offset taxable income that’s already been taxed. This is not correct, it is only practically true in trivial cases. Excess taxation is a very real pain point for Americans living overseas, never mind the other indefensible things the US government does to its expats like FATCA. Many types of income cannot be offset nor or they covered by tax treaties. E…

I once heard a story of a family living abroad feeling quite bent about this extra taxation that they were paying no reason. But the story ends with the family being rescued by a USMC helicopter and airlifted to safety after a natural disaster, at which point they supposed they had been paying for something after all.

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

#535

Post by itake »

elevatedastalt wrote: post #528
itake wrote: post #387

Earlier quoted context omitted.

what is even crazier, is its not just Americans impacted by this. If you have a green card, but not working in the USA, you're impacted by this mess too.

What's funny is America has some of the longest paths to a Green Card (for Indians and Chinese at least), but is very very happy to tax them as a resident the moment they spend a year in the country. Indians effectively pay taxes as residents without any permanent residency benefits for decades

Are there any countries where people on a visa don't need to pay taxes like everyone else?

If I got a job in India, would I not need to pay taxes?

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

#536

Post by sparrc »

cpill wrote: post #519
sparrc wrote: post #501

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On the other hand, I know someone from the UK who moved away and lived in places like Qatar and Oman for 20-30 years, keeping their UK citizenship and paying zero taxes to the UK (and extremely low taxes in the gulf countries). Then they retired, returned to the UK, sent their kids to subsidized state universities (in the UK), receive free healthcare on the NHS, and receive state benefits for retirees. They receive a…

it's not, but it's not the general case and also you realise this is the very opposite of the US: you get taxed when overseas (unless your a large corporation) and then get no benefits when returning because that would be communism.

That's a bit of an exaggeration, social security (state pension) and medicare (state healthcare for retirees) are not perfect but they're not terrible either.

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

#537

Post by randunel »

itake wrote: post #387
jandrewrogers wrote: post #366

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Expats aren’t double taxed but you need to file tax returns to offset taxable income that’s already been taxed. This is not correct, it is only practically true in trivial cases. Excess taxation is a very real pain point for Americans living overseas, never mind the other indefensible things the US government does to its expats like FATCA. Many types of income cannot be offset nor or they covered by tax treaties. E…

what is even crazier, is its not just Americans impacted by this. If you have a green card, but not working in the USA, you're impacted by this mess too.

I'm a non US citizen nor resident, never have been and probably never will be. Because of FATCA, I had to prove to my Eastern European bank (where I actually am a citizen) that I am not a "US person". That designation has no legal meaning, anywhere in my birth country, yet I had to sign a formal written declaration "I, NAME, declare under penalty of penal law, that I am not a US person", to be able to access my funds again.

USA always overreaches.

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

#538

Post by nodamage »

aguaviva wrote: post #504
nodamage wrote: post #491

An important point that seems to have been missed by most of the comments: the reason Apple lost this case is not because of the profit shifting scheme itself, but rather than they did not set up the scheme correctly: > ASI's 2014 structure was an adaptation of a Double Irish scheme, an Irish IP–based BEPS tool used by many US multinationals. Apple did not follow the traditional Double Irish structure of using two se…

So if such an easily obtainable, and comparatively lucrative (but fully legal) option were available -- and if it's so obvious, one has to presume Apple's people would have been perfectly aware of it -- why didn't they just take that route from the beginning (or if not, at least much earlier in this saga)? Something tells me there's more to the story here.

Probably because the original tax rulings were made prior to the existence of the EU. As to why it was never "fixed", I have no idea.

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

#539

Post by cco »

benoau wrote: post #505
martinald wrote: post #502

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just to be clear - I don't think many people have (much) of a problem with ireland's "headline" 12.5% CT rate. The problem is the selective tax rates that Ireland gave to many multinationals, often as low as 0.005% (effectively in return for ensuring x amount of jobs were created in Ireland). I think these are really very much sneaky schemes.

Corruption with a twist: the government is the one who got the kickback.

The opposite, no? The government accepted _much_ less money than is required in exchange for jobs for their constituents.

This is an example of a government prioritizing benefits for some of their constituents (emphasis on some) over the collection of tax dollars (direct benefit to the "government") or monetary reward for themselves (corruption).

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

#540

Post by somat »

GeekyBear wrote: post #440
epolanski wrote: post #424

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's not what really Apple did in Europe to pay little taxes. The scheme was essentially like this: - Apple Ireland bought iphones for 200$ or so (talking about pre X numbers, now they're likely slightly higher) - Apple Ireland sold iPhones to Apple Italy for 599€s - Apple Italy sold iPhones for 599€s + vat (thus avoiding to pay any corporate taxes in Italy while making billions) - Apple Ireland had a special agree…

> avoiding to pay any corporate taxes in Italy This us a fairly common strategy not limited to tech. For instance, Starbucks in the UK: > Starbucks Coffee Company (UK) made a £149m “gross profit” in the year to October 2023, up from £129m the year before. But after “administrative expenses” of £127m, its pre-tax profits were reduced to £16.9m, on which it paid £7.2m tax... In 2012, it was revealed that Starbucks had…

does the UK have an income tax?

Any sane country would rather have the economic boost from the jobs and then take their cut as income tax from that. than tax the company directly, Not to say they will not tax the company, but corporate law is often intentionally designed to let a company pay little tax if it is dumping the money it makes into the economy. why kill the goose that lays the golden eggs?

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