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US Government Seeks To Intervene in Apple's EU Tax Appeal (reuters.com)
The U.S. government has sought to intervene in Apple's appeal against an EU order to pay back up to 13 billion euros ($14.8 billion) in Irish taxes, Reuters is reporting. From a report: iPhone maker Apple took its case to the Luxembourg-based General Court, Europe's second-highest, in December after the European Commission issued the record tax demand saying the U.S. company won sweetheart tax deals from the Irish government which amounted to illegal subsidies. The decision was criticized by the Obama administration which said the European Union was helping itself to cash that should have ended up in the United States. The Trump administration, which has tentatively proposed a tax break on $2.6 trillion in corporate profits being held offshore as part of its tax reform, has not said anything in public about the case.
The EU was all happy to sign up to trade deals with the US and the rest of the world.
Exporting cars, services, machinery, robots, food to the world from within the EU.
A free flow of new cars into the USA. EU products and services in the USA.
People in the EU had the freedom to use advanced, creative and innovative US social media and computer services.
The US brands sold products and services in the EU that worked as sold.
Now the EU is having cash flow issues due to its own domestic policies and wants the USA to pay more?
More costs? New compliance costs? Complex legal issues?
US brands now have to factor in a digital compliance wall that is going up around the EU.
Is the EU worth the risk of investing in or been part of given unexpected, expensive and retroactive legal changes?
Use the freedom of hosting and been in the USA to offer EU users innovative US products and services.
If all the EU can innovate is new costs to investors, thats not a great place for your tech investments.
Freedom of speech, freedom after speech and any easy to follow laws in the USA is starting to make the USA look like a smarter place to grow a tech business.
Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
He will bring all that money Apple has back to the US and everybody will get a free iPhone! But it will only work on Verizon. But hey, that's better than nothing!
MAGA!
and their thieving ways.
Apple, Burger King, and countless others use off shore shelters to protect profits from US taxes.
My thought is that if you sell it here, you pay taxes here. Are taxes too high? Grover Norquest will say yes. Others will say no. I say it doesn't matter what the tax rate is if companies can avoid paying it at all. It makes me sick to think there are some millionaires out there that pay less in total tax than I do. Not less as in percentage, I mean less in absolute dollars. I paid over $35K in taxes last year. There are over one hundred estimated millionaires that paid less than that.
Necessity is the plea for every infringement of human freedom. It is the argument of tyrants; it is the creed of slaves.
If America tries to retaliate they'll open up a full on trade war with Europe.
Not necessarily. Europe has been making a practice of fining major American companies. It's politically popular (in Europe) and it brings them money from people who don't vote in their elections. America could easily retaliate by targeting one or two European companies for similar investigations. It could even be a relatively stable equilibrium that gives some mid-level politicians in both countries accolades at the expense of company shareholders on both continents.
The US regime should stop interfering in the affairs of other countries. If they don't, it seems that sanctions would be appropriate, since this is the approach the US empire itself employs, usually in the flimisiest of 'evidence'. At least here, we have strong evidence of regime interference in other's affairs.
I assume the US government thinks that 0.5% average tax is fine ?
If they have that opinion, I think they should let everybody know, and make sure Apple pays just as little in the US.
If not, shut up and let Apple pay what they rightfuly should have done. Be it 10-20 or 30%. Everybody knows 0.5% is wrong.
what a load of bullshit. How is asking a corporation that makes billions in profit to pay their taxes in the market they operate in, to "help yourself", when what America is doing is literally saying that EU tax money belongs to the US? The American flavor of greed is just unprecedented.
Germany still hasn't had the US squaddie they want to stand trial and the UK is still waiting for the US airmen in the Warthog that shot the British tank column to give their version of the result.
So you can fuck right off until you hand them over, retards.
Fuck off to Somalia and live without taes from government. Or any of the services that are paid for from that. Buy your own security. Your own power. Your own sewerage and water treatment plants. Your own food stocks.
Enjoy.
Get the proper meaning of "it is/has" and "it owns" (its vs it's).
The US has always been that shit role model that tells every other country in the world what should they do, and if they don't they get bombed.
The US should stop being the bully of the world and stick their nukes in their military flagged ass.
Increasingly autocratic European regime headed by Germans is cracking down on free speech, erecting barriers to people attempting to flee the state, raising an army and trying to cover the budget by milking politically expedient sources.
I suspect the Fed sees the (low) estimate of $14 Billion tax as money owed to the US, not the EU.
All that profit offsetting their risks and their claims that the private industry are all risk takers and you claim that they're afraid of any risk???
And, no, this isn't uncertainty. This is the law, it was always the law and was not any different all during this incident. Just because you thought you could get away with bank robbery, you can't claim it's all because you aren't certain whether the law covers that branch of bank.
No, this is just a shakedown. Apple negotiated with Ireland, and then paid the taxes it legally owed to Ireland. Now, the EU is having a hissy fit and shaking down American companies, and demanding that Ireland retroactively change its tax law.
This is such a longstanding European tactic that it's specifically prohibited by our Constitution, the "no ex post facto" laws.