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Apple face HUGE tax bill

Henrin said:
Sigh. Your argument is really dumb. You're basically saying that I only own something until a thief comes and takes it from me. Of course in your case the thief is government and they can go out into international waters and destroy ****.
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It is a fact of life.. Saddam owned Iraq until the US came and took it from him.. no different for you.

But it is irrelevant. Countries can just block companies that put themselves on boats in international waters. Everything from refusing business licences, stopping banking for them to outright nationalization of company property.
 
PeteEU said:
It is a fact of life.. Saddam owned Iraq until the US came and took it from him.. no different for you.

But it is irrelevant. Countries can just block companies that put themselves on boats in international waters. Everything from refusing business licences, stopping banking for them to outright nationalization of company property.
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You sure do support a lot of government control. People like you should not be allowed to vote.
 
PeteEU said:
About time, but I fear that it will only be a couple hundred million they will have to pay.

And as for other companies... all of them. So many profitable mult-national companies have been getting illegal aid over the decades and it has to stop. It prevents competition in the market.
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And I thought that all these laissez-faire guys were against welfare? Seems like corporate welfare is big business.
 
PeteEU said:
Irony is.. the "we".. lets say the Irish, have lost out on 13+ billion in tax income, an income that could have helped big time during the crisis and afterwards. Wonder how the Irish government is going to spin this to the Irish people...

.. no we dont want the 13 billion because the EU is being mean against us... you know the EU, who exposed us in giving illegal state aid with tax payer money to one of the worlds most profitable companies... while only generating a couple of thousand jobs in Ireland at present... most of which are new hires since Apples size in Ireland only started to grow after the EU started their investigation..
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The real irony is that the agreed upon deal between Apple and Ireland resulted in thousands of jobs being brought to their country. Without that deal, you don't have those jobs, all the ancillary jobs that supports it, and all that revenue generated for the employees to purchase goods, which helps their local economies.

What do you get if the deal hadn't been made? None of that.
 
Ikari said:
Honestly, yes, in the EU the member-states aren't fully sovereign. Particularly any State foolish enough to have given up its own currency for the Euro.

But in general, this exists with every nation. The US makes treaty and contract and we are bound to that. We are free to engage in the treaty and contract we wish, but when we agree to the rules and oversight we have bound ourselves to the system. So too here. Ireland made the agreements, accepted the contracts, and now they are bound to them.
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That is quite true. Of course the degree is significant, which is extremely high, when you can no longer set your taxes low or adjust them to the differing requirements of investors. This degree was not known to the public nor it appears to the German high court, for that matter judging by some of their rulings concerning the legality of EU and Euro treaties. But worst of all, the governments of a number of members seem not to have realized, what the treaties meant that they signed. Or do you think it was fraud and they realised they were cheating the investors?
 
PeteEU said:
Wrong. Apple does not have a firm commitment if you bothered to read the news. Ireland has said that it will appeal the decision because it wants to defend Irish corporate tax law.. not Apple.



First off.. what court ruling? Again you have no clue on any matters.
Secondly,... yes they do. You do realize that they broke their own laws on subsidies right? Yes.. Irish law was broken.



What on earth are you babbling about now?



LOL are you ****ing serious? Yes the rule of law is being enforced!. Apple got favourable tax benefits than any of its competitors. Investors will be glad that now the playing field is more level. I would not be surprised if there are going to be lawsuits starting up from pissed off Apple investors. You forget one thing... Apple stock is based in part on the money it has at hand.... which we now know is padded with illegal state aid.



Ireland broke EU law on illegal state aid.



Eerr investors like countries where the rule of law is enforced and no one or no company has special benefits.
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My goodness. You are really unbelievable. Do they pay you? ;)
 
Fishking said:
The real irony is that the agreed upon deal between Apple and Ireland resulted in thousands of jobs being brought to their country. Without that deal, you don't have those jobs, all the ancillary jobs that supports it, and all that revenue generated for the employees to purchase goods, which helps their local economies.

What do you get if the deal hadn't been made? None of that.
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Yup, and if trickle down worked we'd have a much lower gap between lowest and highest earners.

Estimates from what I have read are that Apple directly employs 5000 people in Ireland so, a tax bill of 13,000,000,000 Euros equates to 2,600,000 Euros per employee, if you can demonstrate that this level of trickle down is realistic based upon what they might be paying in wages at Apple then I will listen.
 
Kal'Stang said:
The quote in your post gave me an idea.

What could any government do if one, or even several major corporations teamed up to put a boat in international waters, where no country has control, and made it their headquarters? Hell, they could even build floating, or submerged, facilities out there.
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A business could buy out the owners of the Principality of Sealand. Pretty neat read as well.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Principality_of_Sealand
 
William Rea said:
Yup, and if trickle down worked we'd have a much lower gap between lowest and highest earners.

Estimates from what I have read are that Apple directly employs 5000 people in Ireland so, a tax bill of 13,000,000,000 Euros equates to 2,600,000 Euros per employee, if you can demonstrate that this level of trickle down is realistic based upon what they might be paying in wages at Apple then I will listen.
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What trickles down from zero if you don't attract anyone to come there at all?
 
joG said:
That is quite true. Of course the degree is significant, which is extremely high, when you can no longer set your taxes low or adjust them to the differing requirements of investors. This degree was not known to the public nor it appears to the German high court, for that matter judging by some of their rulings concerning the legality of EU and Euro treaties. But worst of all, the governments of a number of members seem not to have realized, what the treaties meant that they signed. Or do you think it was fraud and they realised they were cheating the investors?
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I think likely they knew what they had signed, or to some level did, and that they went ahead with this to get Apple there thinking that once it's there and has been established (if they could fly it under the radar long enough), that then the EU will have to deal with the fact that it is am existing system and thus would have a harder time counter-acting it. But that's conjecture. I just, in general, have little faith that government ever acts honestly.
 
Infinite Chaos said:
Fair few other companies will be quaking in their boots if this bill is enforced on Apple. Who else would you prefer to see pay up unpaid taxes first?
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This is where the country joins a union to have benefits for all it's members. some of this money will go to eastern europe, where it is most needed, but that is not enough. depending on how many people could afford apple products or any other products in their country means that they would be losing a lot of money for the sake of the rich countries, who see their money depleted by not investing in other countries, but more on that later.

If a first world country makes a product, it will cost more to make it, and, that is why if this goes through, they should invest in a poorer country like in eastern europe to bring them enough money to buy, for example, german goods. this promotes bigger trade, of course.

Now, if the taxes are too much for now, and they go through, maybe apple or any other big company could rather pledge to invest in certain countries, maybe more than what the taxation was? this special case is available to big companies, and, it would serve everyone better, yes?
 
Ikari said:
I think likely they knew what they had signed, or to some level did, and that they went ahead with this to get Apple there thinking that once it's there and has been established (if they could fly it under the radar long enough), that then the EU will have to deal with the fact that it is am existing system and thus would have a harder time counter-acting it. But that's conjecture. I just, in general, have little faith that government ever acts honestly.
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In that event the governments defauded the companies? Defrauded their voters? Coerced their high courts to pronounce the treaties legal?
 
joG said:
In that event the governments defauded the companies? Defrauded their voters? Coerced their high courts to pronounce the treaties legal?
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I think they were maybe trying to "defraud" the EU in general. They are the ones with the rules on tax subsidies and deals that Ireland seemed interested in side-stepping. It's a quagmire in the end, it's hard to decipher anything the EU does.
 
I'm disagreeing a lot of the anti-fine comments here, I want a free market where companies are on level playing fields and pay the same in taxes as other companies. I wonder how many of the comments have also read the comment by Apple that they won't repatriate $181 billion in profits to the US until US tax rules are changed to suit Apple?
 
Ireland has a choice. If they wish to remain in the EU, which I believe they do overwhelmingly, then they have to abide by the regulations. They may win their appeal (I suspect they'll have the very best representation Apple can afford) in which case, end of story, but if they don't... they'll have to apply the rules or suffer the consequences.

What's interesting is that a lot of media are directly linking this story to the sounds coming out of France and Germany that the TTIP negotiations have failed. Could this be the beginning of the end of the global corporatist, unregulated free-for-all?
 
I know...the U.S. could just, rightly so, just tell Volvo that they now owe us a bazillion dollars for their purposeful manipulation of their diesel engines. If Europe wants to play games? Let's play games.
 
PeteEU said:
What fine?
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A tax imposed by the government under pain of law is by another name, a fine - in this case, a fine for doing business in the EU.

PeteEU said:
You do understand that Ireland are owed 14 billion by Apple right?
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Not according to the mutual agreement that the sovereign nation of Ireland offered to and entered into with Apple. That not so little point is continually being ignored.
 
Beaudreaux said:
A tax imposed by the government under pain of law is by another name, a fine - in this case, a fine for doing business in the EU.
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LOL talk about bull****.

Not according to the mutual agreement that the sovereign nation of Ireland offered to and entered into with Apple. That not so little point is continually being ignored.
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Yes an agreement that breaks its treaty obligations on not giving unauthorized state sponsored aid to any companies. Something you are ignoring....
 
Fishking said:
The real irony is that the agreed upon deal between Apple and Ireland resulted in thousands of jobs being brought to their country. Without that deal, you don't have those jobs, all the ancillary jobs that supports it, and all that revenue generated for the employees to purchase goods, which helps their local economies.

What do you get if the deal hadn't been made? None of that.
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Actually it is more pathetic than that.

This deal has been in place for 20 years. The "thousands of jobs", is something that has happened the last 5 or so years... mostly AFTER the EU took up the case. Fact is, before the EU took up the case, the amount of Apple employees in Ireland was in the low hundreds if that.

Ireland has gotten very little out of this deal. And companies are in Ireland not because of this deal.. because no one else can have this deal. They are there because of the low corporate tax system... so chances are that Apple would have based it self in Ireland regardless, because all its competitors are pretty much there. Difference is, that say Microsoft pays 12.5% of its profits, Apple only paid 0.005%....
 
William Rea said:
And I agree with EC on this, if you are part of an free trade economic zone then you cannot be allowed take 'take the piss' out of that arrangement by handing out incentives in direct competition with your partners. If Ireland doesn't like it then they should get out of the EU.
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The Irish government has some explaining to do if they start wanting out of the EU over this. Imagine the campaign... "We want out of the EU because they are forcing 13 billion Euros on us that we gave away to a big American corporation"... that will go over well with the Irish mother and father that cant get hospital treatment for their kids because of lack of funding..
 
Fishking said:
I know...the U.S. could just, rightly so, just tell Volvo that they now owe us a bazillion dollars for their purposeful manipulation of their diesel engines. If Europe wants to play games? Let's play games.
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How about the US just tells corporations to pay their taxes. No games required.

And it was VW in the diesel scandal, not Volvo.
 
PeteEU said:
~ The "thousands of jobs", is something that has happened the last 5 or so years... mostly AFTER the EU took up the case. Fact is, before the EU took up the case, the amount of Apple employees in Ireland was in the low hundreds if that ~
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Wonder what job those 5000 or so actually do, production of Apple devices is largely in China and the far East. Industrial Design and all the production design is done in the US. As a base for managing EU sales operations you don't need that many staff.
 
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