Taxation is a reserved area where all countries must agree to changes unanimously. Those are the rules.
Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
Ireland Agrees to Appeal European Commission's Apple Tax Ruling
- Thread starter MacRumors
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
Taxation is a reserved area where all countries must agree to changes unanimously. Those are the rules.
First Brexit. Now this.
It's not even about Apple any more…. the narrative has changed to "Can Ireland assert its sovereignty? Or does the EU manage to assert its domination and lordship over (supposedly) sovereign EU states?"
Pass the popcorn, with plenty of butter please!
It's not even about Apple any more…. the narrative has changed to "Can Ireland assert its sovereignty? Or does the EU manage to assert its domination and lordship over (supposedly) sovereign EU states?"
Pass the popcorn, with plenty of butter please!
I don't think anything about tax laws is simple to be honest. There is a reason corps like Apple establish corp headquarters in Ireland. It's not because they love the beautiful Irish countryside. It is for the complicated tax shelters that are provided to them. Then as part of the EU....the whole union loses billions because one country decided to break the rules the collective agreed to.
Hypothetically if all countries agreed to tax at the same rate I'm pretty sure the other countries would still be pissed at having all the taxation occur in Ireland. The problem is that they aren't collecting tax on their economic activity not whatever rate Ireland charges.
I'm just saying Ireland is appealing because they gave Apple a tax bill, Apple paid it in full, and Ireland agrees they paid it in full.
If all countries had the same rate companies might prefer to headquarter in places with less rain and more sun than Ireland. Actually being on the continent would have some advantages too. Ireland would like too keep the jobs. More jobs means more income tax, more VAT, less unemployment benefits. To Ireland the friendly tax law is just leveling the playing field.
Because they are a sovereign nation and Brussels doesn't establish blanket EU tax code, so recategorizing this as "state aid" is a very tenuous power grab.
No less valid than other people's opinion that Apple is paying less taxes than it should.
Irish company or subsidiary of an Irish company?
[doublepost=1472829071][/doublepost]
Probably more the loose regulation than the weather. I gather weather isn't the reason so many US companies incorporate in Delaware.
And meanwhile Apple has an overall tax rate of 26% or so. Global taxes paid divided by global profits is 0.26.
More than Microsoft or Google.
They are just not paying a lot of that in the EU.
This is about who collects the tax.
And since tax reform is too gnarly a problem the EU is repurposing competition rules to get what they want.
Also that the US allows their corporations to leave their profits untaxed offshore is something the EU doesn't like. Thinking that all those trillions are just sitting there, someone aught to tax those. Maybe by threatening to take some of it they are trying to goad the US in taxing those profits.
I still think its just a ploy for the EC to snatch £11bn from Apple in Ireland before we're out of the EU and out of their grasp...
also, every newspaper in the country has this on the front page, but MacRumors? No no, 'mac blog'.
also, every newspaper in the country has this on the front page, but MacRumors? No no, 'mac blog'.
No they don't the money made from this tax avoidance scheme is held in Bermuda and Cayman islands.
That's how incorporation works.
[doublepost=1472830722][/doublepost]
Not Apple's. They have another trick.
Unless it reflects economic reality, it's considered fraudulent.
Last edited:
Ireland has the lowest tax rate in Europe at 12.5 percent that is not about to change. What the EU and others are upset about is not the 12.5 percent tax rate. It is the additional "Shell company" Apple sales international" which has zero employees and zero assets and no tax liability in Ireland even thought it is set up in Ireland. All of the international income outside of Ireland is channeled through this company, and then to the Caribbean. This company pays no tax anywhere.
When the EU says the effective rate in Ireland is 1 percent or less they are looking at the total income going through ireland. The piece earned by the local tax paying company and the piece that no tax is pay on in the international company.
Also, Neelie Kroes (Steely Neelie, who gave Microsoft a hard time) who had the European Commissioner for Competition job until 2010 thinks Verstager, the current Commissioner, is doing it wrong.
[doublepost=1472831810][/doublepost]
[doublepost=1472831810][/doublepost]
Then someone would be suing. It is not actually fraudulent in a legal sense. At least not to Irish lawmakers.
Last edited:
IT & Hi-tech sector employs around 10% of all Irish workforce. There's no doubt their government will fight to the end. In court room they most likely try to find a level that is not any more illegal state aid, but it is still good deal for the corporations.
Bottom line, the nation state system for ordering the world is not equipped to handle global corporations bigger and smarter than the nation states. When they try, as they must, things get messy.
What rules are you talking about? The free movement of Capital - is it? The problem is with the rules inside the EU, you know the three pillars - free movement of people, capital and goods.
Ireland is as much a part of the EU than any other member and we are not going anywhere (I think).
You saw what happened when Germany browbeat Greece last year. Why did they do that you ask? To put Greece in there place and hopefully topple the government. Epic failure. But you might not know or realise that was as much if not more of a warning from the German government to the French Government to fall into line, pay down debt, not to mention debt right-downs and not rock the boat in general by stoking up ideas such as a more social Europe or maybe France could be the next target. Yes target. If France backed Italy (debt right-downs from German banks) it would have been a completely different picture for Greece - but the French Government heeded the warning from the Germans and capitulated.
[doublepost=1472833266][/doublepost]
What about the French breaking the EU deficit reduction rules?
European Union competition law
"European competition law promotes the maintenance of competition within the European Union."
Four main policy areas include:
- Cartels, or control of collusion and other anti-competitive practices, under article 101 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union (TFEU).
- Market dominance, or preventing the abuse of firms' dominant market positions under article 102 TFEU.
- Mergers, control of proposed mergers, acquisitions and joint ventures involving companies that have a certain, defined amount of turnover in the EU, according to the Merger Regulation[1]
- State aid, control of direct and indirect aid given by Member States of the European Union to companies under TFEU article 107"
State aid
"Under European Union competition law the term has a legal meaning, being any measure that demonstrates all the characteristics in Article 107 TFEU.[1] Measures which fall within the definition of state aid are unlawful unless provided under an exemption or notified.
The first chapter of the law defines what is not allowed to be done with state aid and the second chapter defines actions that can be done within legal limits.
1. Save as otherwise provided in the Treaties, any aid granted by a Member State or through State resources in any form whatsoever which distorts or threatens to distort competition by favouring certain undertakings or the production of certain goods shall, in so far as it affects trade between Member States, be incompatible with the internal market."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/State_aid
Ireland has a lower tax rate for companies but a higher cost of living for its citizens, it's not right. They also get the iPhone later than in the UK lol