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Apple Argued That Buildings at Its Headquarters Were Worth $200, Not $1B, To Reduce Its Tax Bill: Report (sfchronicle.com)
Apple argued that buildings it owned around Cupertino, where it is headquartered, were only worth $200 instead of the $1 billion tax assessors deemed in 2015, according to appeals reviewed by the San Francisco Chronicle. From a report: The report characterized the dispute as part of an aggressive strategy by Apple to lower its tax bills. According to the Chronicle, Apple has 489 open appeals in tax disputes over property assessed at $8.5 billion in Santa Clara County, Calif., dating back to 2004. Those appeals include the $1 billion building assessed by tax officials, as well as another $384 million property that Apple also claims is worth $200. Apple is now valued at $1 trillion. It is also the county's biggest taxpayer, paying $56 million in the 2017-2018 tax year.
I know a guy who got a dog and called it a company mascot and had his company pay for all the pet supplies. People will try anything, it doesn't make it right.
Laws are rules for the court, but merely a bottom bar to hit for life. Think beyond laws in your actions always.
and then they'll complain that the schools aren't producing the highly educated people they need to fill jobs, so they need more H1B visas. This same crap has been going on in Silicon Valley for decades.
I'll take them off their hands for $250.
apply a similar steep discounted valuation, to any apple product, to arrive at its true worth as a product.
rest is hype and manipulation of herd behavior.
apple product user = herd animal with low agency
Apple is clearly making very poor use of the land this lowering it's value to catastrophic levels. I say San Francisco used Eminent domain to take the land and put it to good use (perhaps for public housing). The city will, of course, compensate Apple for the full, fair market value of $200. Heck, I say pay them twice that, an almost unheard of $400 dollars, to cover the expanse of obtaining a new headquarters. I mean, when you put it like that it's a win win
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Let people set their own valuations, but the valuation is also a public tender for sale at that price.
That is all.
If an individual lies on taxes, they go to jail.
If a corporation lies on taxes, they get rewarded.
I'm a good cook. I'm a fantastic eater. - Steven Brust
"Some claims reflect extreme differences in estimated values. In one appeal filed in 2015, Apple said that a cluster of properties in and around Apple Park in Cupertino that the assessor valued at $1 billion was worth just $200. In another, property that the assessor valued at $384 million was, in Apple's view, worth $200, according to an appeal application."
What an amazing coincidence that two properties, one assessed at over double the value of the other, are both only worth $200 according to Apple.
The article continues, with an explanation why:
"Other assessors say large corporations are using their resources to hire attorneys and expert witnesses to eventually wear down county governments."
and more engineers.
The whole point of incorporation is to make it so the individuals in the corporation are not liable for this sort of thing. As long as the blame can be spread, no one is to blame.
They are the single most "regressive" tax we have, to say nothing of the fact that they're the granddaddy of the logic behind civil asset forfeiture.
I get that the schools and other local services need revenue, but there are better and more moral taxes that can be applied. With modern GIS software, it is perfectly feasible for the state tax agency to build a system that will be able to map taxes owed on income and sales to the right tax authorities so neither the private citizen nor the local government have to do it. They could just impose an extra 3% sales tax and an extra 3-5% income tax and call it a day after abolishing property taxes at the state level.
Tax on the poor? Sure, but the poor pay property taxes too. You think rental owners don't pass that onto their tenants? The renting poor pay a share of property taxes too and have to do so even in bad times. Switching that to sales and income taxes would at least let the poor to reduce that equivalent tax payment when things get really tough (as you can't tax non-existent income and they can stop spending on non-essentials)
If you read the article, Apple didn't say that its HQ was worth $200. From SF Chronicle article:
Some claims reflect extreme differences in estimated values. In one appeal filed in 2015, Apple said that a cluster of properties in and around Apple Park
in Cupertino that the assessor valued at $1 billion was worth just $200. In another, property that the assessor valued at $384 million was, in Appleâ(TM)s view, worth $200, according to an appeal application
What are these properties? I don't know. I'd have to look at the appeal. It could be that the dispute is not over the HQ.
Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.
Arguing that your property is worth less than what the government is estimating, for the purpose of trying to lower your property taxes, is standard procedure everywhere. Apple doing it doesn't make this tech news.
What you can and can't get away with.
Everything else is just talk.
Apple can go piss off a wind-swept roof, facing the wind, and pay their property tax bill just like I do.
So you just blindly pay your taxes on the assessed value? I don't. I review my assessed value verses market conditions when they send me their proposed valuation every year and IF I felt the value they had was out of line, I'd be objecting. I suggest all property owners do the same thing.
So all this really is, is Apple contesting their assessed value. $1B seems a bit steep, and $200 seems very low, but this is just a negotiation in the starting phases. They will reach a value that's in-between the two extremes eventually.
All we have here is somebody trying to make Apple look bad by releasing their bargaining position so it gets tried in the press, which may be fair, but unfortunate that things get decided like this in the press. The appeals process should run it's course, unhindered by such interference by the likes of the local news paper.
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Apple argued that buildings it owned around Cupertino, where it is headquartered, were only worth $200 instead of the $1 billion tax assessors deemed in 2015,
If that's the case, I'd be willing to buy it from them at double the value they're claiming it to be worth. That should make them happy as they'll make double what it's worth to them.
But ... but ... Steve Jobs! Looking thoughtful! Memes!
All we have here is somebody trying to make Apple look bad by releasing their bargaining position so it gets tried in the press, which may be fair, but unfortunate that things get decided like this in the press. The appeals process should run it's course, unhindered by such interference by the likes of the local news paper.
Right.... Apple has the right to appeal for FAIR UNBIASED due process regarding the assessed value.. The newspapers are unfairly meddling which might result in anti-Apple bias in the process. This is not fair or right.... it seems in the future it might be more prudent for such appeals to be kept confidential --- It should be a matter of public record for the property what the tax disposition is, but they ought to seal the records until there is no longer an active challenge/appeals process in progress.
Given a corporate tax of 21% I'm led to believe Apple took in about $280 million in profit last year from the $56 million in taxes. Oh wait they made closer to $10 billion. Maybe they should pay their damn taxes or get the hell out of the US. It's appalling we let corporations get away with this, even more we seem to encourage it. Given Apples ample reserve cash there is absolutely no excuse for this, this should be enough for people to wake up and boycott their products, as if the consumer gouging on excessively marked up products in the first place wasn't enough.
Cupertino to Apple: "We are expropriating your property and will pay you $200,000 which is 1000 times market value, so you have no basis for a complaint."
Companies and people have a sole duty to lower there tax bill as much as possible. If it isn't written in law do not give Uncle Sam anymore than the law says.
Yeah, you're going to need to save all that money to pay the toll for every road you need to use. Extend your medical insurance to cover police and fire, pay the electric, water, gas and every other service that relies on public utilities etc etc. But if people did pay what the law says things would mostly be fine but when they lie, cheat and steal to reduce that bill, especially when you're literally one of the richest companies in the world and are doing nothing but hoarding wealth. Also I think you need to be aware of what sole means.
Wanna buy a shirt?
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So, if these are valued at $200, it should benefit the shareholders if I was to make them the lucrative offer of $500 per building, correct?
There is no XUL, only WebExtensions...
The whole point of incorporation is to make it so the individuals in the corporation are not liable for this sort of thing. As long as the blame can be spread, no one is to blame.
Then shut down the company committing the act.
Wanna buy a shirt?
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Two months ago I bought my house, at the price the market determined was fair. A few months later I received the tax assessment at over 50% more than what it actually sold for on the open market, and over $100,000 more than I would have paid for it. That shows you how accurate tax assessments are.
I appealed, exactly as Apple is doing, and got the value set correctly. Each of the last two years, the government has assessed it as increasing in value 10% every year, the maximum amount they legally can. Home values in my area are not increasing 10% per year. They just want to tax me as much as possible.
The assessment was that far off on an ordinary house, that is basically just like all the neighboring houses, though larger than most. It should be an easy assessment since my house and others in the neighborhood have sold recently. The Apple buildings aren't just like all of the other buildings around them, so there isn't that easy comparison. Determining the value it might sell for is difficult and subjective. Maybe it would only sell for $200 million for the building (vs the land). Maybe it would sell for a billion. I don't know, but I sure don't assume that the county's first try is right and fair.
The county should take it via eminent domain and pay Apple the claimed value. The public good underlying the taking would be discouraging this sort of BS.
So the whole point of incorporation is to make it so corporations can break the law and face no repercussions?
Same question as the last guy, your house is worth $10? When you appealed, they accepted that?
Laws are rules for the court, but merely a bottom bar to hit for life. Think beyond laws in your actions always.
$200 is not a good-faith bargaining position.
There really needs to be a corporate death penalty whereby a company can lose it's corporate charter protections. The only reason there isn't is because corporations now run the world. We as a people fucked up.
There is a big difference between claiming tax relief for purposes that are truthful and valid, and blatantly trying to cheat the system.
Laws are rules for the court, but merely a bottom bar to hit for life. Think beyond laws in your actions always.
I don't think you'd get arrested for tax evasion, your valuation would just be rejected.
XML is like violence. If it doesn't solve the problem, use more.
My first guess was that the building had depreciated but the land on which it was built had not.
It's called DEPRECIATION. So next year the building will be worth, what, $100? The point behind capital depreciation is so an old building is worth the value of an old building. This is a new building that should not have depreciated much yet.
Laws are rules for the court, but merely a bottom bar to hit for life. Think beyond laws in your actions always.
Can't remember if that was Apple or somebody else, but I know one of the big tech companies was running it's own bus company.
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Where were the Santa Clara County assessors while this was going on? It's one thing for Apple to be overly aggressive in their tax avoidance. But the fact that they even tried this means that they knew the county officials were asleep at the switch. Time for some housecleaning at the local gov't.
Have gnu, will travel.
Commercial buildings are depreciated over 39 years. That is, the building's construction cost is a business expense, and thus tax deductible (you don't pay tax on the money you spent on expenses). But because it's a purchase that's used for so long, you're not allowed to deduct the whole thing in a single year. Instead, you take the building's construction cost, and divide it (depreciate it) over 39 years, and use that as your annual tax deduction.
If Apple says the building is only worth $200, then their tax deduction for building depreciation over the next 39 years can only be a maximum of $5.13 per year. So either they pay the property tax on a $1 billion building (which at Prop 13's 1% cap and utilities of about 1% works out to about $20 million/yr in taxes), or they lose an annual tax deduction of ($1 billion) / (39 years) = $25.6 million (which at the 35% corporate tax rate would be $8.96 million/yr).
I suspect what's going on is some accountant did this math and decided it would be cheaper to give up building depreciation in exchange for a lower tax assessment. But now their gig has been discovered and they're at risk of both losing the building depreciation tax deduction, while having it assessed at its full value for property taxes. If that's not what they're doing, and they're audaciously depreciating the building by $25.6 million on this year's taxes while simultaneously claiming it's only worth $200 for property tax assessment, then this is simple. They've legally admitted to the IRS that the building is worth $1 billion. Claiming to the assessor that it's only worth $200 constitutes fraud and possibly perjury.
Because if they don't bring in a certain amount of money they'll be fired?
We bought a house in an OK neighborhood. It hadn't been lived in in a year, needed a new garage door, front door, new carpet, new windows, the yard was overgrown and it had one giant elm tree and six ash trees that had to be taken down.
A week after we closed it was assessed for 25% over the sale price. That would have made it the most expensive piece of property on the street, which it certainly was not, and one of the most expensive houses in the entire neighborhood, which it *definitely* wasn't.
When we complained to the board they couldn't come up with a good reason why it was valued so high, or explain the reasoning behind the valuation. The assessor never even left his car, he eyeballed the property from the street.
The same thing happened to our friends. Apparently their old 2,000ft^2 ranch was worth more than the brand new 3,000ft^2 colonial on a larger lot that had sold the year before across the street. Turns out the city's pension fund had taken a hit and all of a sudden assessments were coming in WAY over the selling price.
My property taxes are due in November. I just barely got a new valuation from the city which upped last year's by 20%. No inspector came to my house; I believe they had a formula with lot size and finished square footage as inputs. To be fair, this year's assessment roughly matches last year's market value.
That's just blatant fraude, no building (except maybe some wooden outhouse toilet) is worth $200, especially not one owned by Apple. Why aren't these people in jail? If I were to do it, I would have been in jail immediately, but Apple can do whatever it wants.. If you circumvent paying taxes, well yes, then your bankaccount can accumulate a lot of money..
So, based on a news paper report, you are ready to bash Apple for being cheap? We have jumped into this process in the very beginning, not at the end, Apple has gotten away with nothing yet.
It's like you blasting a car dealer for daring to publish the MSRP as their asking price or bashing the buyer for offering the dealer $100 for that new car. Everybody knows that the actual price is someplace in-between and negotiations are just getting started. Why did the news paper inject itself in this story? To bash Apple as the big money evil corporation trying to skip out on paying it's fair share. The truth here is Apple is trying to reduce it's tax liability, nothing wrong with that. What's going to HAPPEN here is the tax office will hear Apple's appeal, justify their idea of what the buildings are worth and Apple will pay taxes on that. Why drag them though the mud on this, except to bash the evil corporation as a tax cheat, even when it's not.
From my perspective this is why news papers shouldn't be involved. Taxable values should NOT be argued in the court of public opinion, but by people who actually know how to appraise the actual values of buildings.
"File to fit, pound to insert, paint to match" - Aircraft Maintenance 101
Again I don't what know exact property is being appealed. For example the assessor thinks the green space in the center of the HQ is worth $1B while Apple disagrees.
Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.
If the tax evaluation of the building is supposed to include its contents as well then it should be easy to prove tax fraud. If there is literally any Apple computer in that building then the contents are, using Apple's own valuations, at least about ten times higher than they state.
There is a big difference between claiming tax relief for purposes that are truthful and valid, and blatantly trying to cheat the system.
They aren't trying to cheat the system; they are simply disputing a ridiculous valuation by the system, by using the system's appeals process.
Your adjuster made a mistake, obviously. It happens. In this case it doesn't matter whether the adjuster made a mistake or not, the campus is not worth $200. What do you think would have happened if, when you appealed your assessment, you tried to claim your house was worth $5?
Laws are rules for the court, but merely a bottom bar to hit for life. Think beyond laws in your actions always.
Companies and people have a sole duty to lower there tax bill as much as possible. If it isn't written in law do not give Uncle Sam anymore than the law says.
Here's the quote you were fishing-for:
http://intltax.typepad.com/int...
And they are introducing a ridiculous valuation of their own, thus trying to cheat the system. The building cost $5B to build. It matters not whether $1B is wrong, it is definitely closer to that than it is to $200.
Laws are rules for the court, but merely a bottom bar to hit for life. Think beyond laws in your actions always.
I realize that they do not want to pay taxes. I also don't want to pay Apple prices for their laptops. However, if I take a laptop from one of their stores and give them $1 in exchange I would get arrested for theft. The same should apply to whoever in Apple valued the building at $200, only the charge should be deliberate tax fraud...and if by some chance this is even vaguely legal then the US government needs to do some very serious overhauling of its corporate tax laws.
Apple wants to claim the building is worth $200, fine.
Write them a check for $600 and declare the government is using Eminent Domain to take the property after paying 3 times what they valued it for.
excitingthingstodo.blogspot.com
Are you sure you're not in a best use area for assessments?
Wow, sent an e-mail as suggested when clicking on "use classic" banner, and got a fast response that addressed my msg
Like a people try to undervalue their house through out the nation so that they can have lower taxes. And only get their homes asses when they try selling them? Oh wait, it's a big company. Only individuals should be able to run scams like that. Never a big company.
Anonymous comments are as pathetic as the anonymous "sources" that contaminate gutless journalism from the New York Time
Well it isn't $200 for sure. Not with California's property prices.
(rephrased slightly from my comment on the article)
A simple legislative solution to address some egregious property tax assessment appeals would be to mandate that when submitting a proposed valuation, the taxing body has the right to immediately purchase the property for some TBD multiplier of your submitted valuation. I suspect that multiplier should be in the 3-5x range.
Obviously there'd need to be reasonable allowances for time to move out, but the cost of moving should be covered by the multiplier.
If Apple wants to contend that a chunk of property is only worth $200, great! I'm sure the city can find $1000 to properly compensate them for that property and the cost of vacating it. Perhaps the city can find something more beneficial to do with that property that might provide more tax revenue.
fencepost
just a little off
Heck, if Apple thinks they are only sitting on $200 worth of real estate at One Infinity Loop I'll be glad to buy it at triple that value, cash in hand!
State files an eminent domain against the buildings on the basis that it is high value land. And as such, will be re-developed in in a fashion to ensure that the utilization of said land exceeds $200.
[This has been done repeatedly across the nation. While eminent domain was once relegated exclusively toward public projects, it has since been expanded to private economic development.]
Recognizing that eminent domain is seldom popular with land holders, the state of California will be generously offering 500% of the stated values provided by Apple, Inc. Or... $1,000 for the buildings upon the land.
Let's see how quickly they back up on that one...
There you go. These buildings are just dongles to the larger building. And nobody charges more than $200 for a dongle. That is how they evaluate at the $200.
And then turn it into a commercial work life experience building
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
In the two US states in which I have resided as a property owner, the tax records record the size of your lot, the square footage of your house, the quality of the construction, and some other parameters that are then used in a formula to calculate the "assessed value" of your property. Comparable property sales are used to establish how and how much the parameters contribute to the value. The assessor only makes an in person visit every few years, to confirm that the parameters appear to be correct. You can appeal an assessment based on errors in fact (square footage is wrong, for example) or reasons why the comparable properties used for valuation are not valid indicators of the value of your property. Recent sales carry more weight than older sales. Standard houses (in a subdivision of similar houses) have more direct comparables than more unique, custom one-of-a-kind houses or houses in unique locations (either good unique or bad unique).
All of this leaves open the question of whether the assessor picks a value first, then seeks comparables to justify the value, or finds comparables first, then sees what the impact on the assessed value is. And there can be a lot of wiggle room in what is "comparable", and how non-exact matches are adjusted up or down to get a comparable value.
Wrote:
Two months ago I bought my house,
That should be:
Two years ago I bought my house,
This is about a property evaluation 2015, three years ago. I find it interesting that the Chronicle article this is based on, and all of the articles parroting the Chronicle, conveniently leave out the result. When reporting on "Apple appealed the county's assessment three years ago", wouldn't it make sense to tell us how the appeal turned out?
I see that the current tax assessment for the Apple headquarters building is $398,600,000. It may be that Apple's value is closer to correct than the number the county initially tried to get them for.
But I'll bet you didn't claim it was only worth $200 either.
It cost $5B to build, $1B isn't out of line at all.
Laws are rules for the court, but merely a bottom bar to hit for life. Think beyond laws in your actions always.
It is also the county's biggest taxpayer, paying $56 million in the 2017-2018 tax year.
On 2017 net income of $48.35 billion ($48350 million), that's a tax rate of 0.116%. Tell me again why we needed another corporate tax rate cut....
~Idarubicin
I think the solution used by your home town is ultimately a bad thing for the citizens. First is that this is clearly yet another case of companies privatizing profits while socializing costs. Second; in theory, a number of private companies collectively providing a service is good for the people because it encourages competition. Yet time after time where a commodity service or product is being provided by a small number of closely cooperating companies, we end up seeing collusion and price fixing. It's simply easier to ensure high profits through price fixing than through efficient cost management.
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I suspect Apple may have actually said $200 million.
All articles on the topic cite a single SF Chronicle article that said $200, so the author of the only article originating that number may have easily missed typing the M in $200M. Also, I see the Chronicle writer was careful to leave out important information about what happened with the appeal.
The assessment appeal the article was based on was in 2015, three years ago.
The Apple HQ building is currently assessed at $386 million.
Given the $386M number is the result after both sides presented their evidence and arguments, it's the most accurate / objective number available.
Given the actual value of $386M, that's closer to $200 than it is to a billion. The county was off by $614M, Apple was off by $386M. Meaning the original assessment was twice as ridiculous as Apple's (sarcastic?) response of $200, if in fact they said $200 as opposed to $200M.
> fairly unlikely that small players every get audited
If you play Russian roulette with a 6-gun, it's fairly unlikely that you'll blow your brains out.
Let's guesstimate an income tax rate of 25% and suppose the dog costs $200 / month. That number may be high, but it'll do. The tax (fraud) savings would be $600 / year. So he's hoping for a gain of $600.
Tax fraud has a five year sentence. Risking prison time trying to save $600 isn't what I'd call a good idea.
The chance of an audit is probably much higher than he thinks, as well. First, x% of companies get audited EACH year. Ten times as many companies get audited each decade. Your odds of eventually getting caught are much higher than the odds each time. Criminalsis and keep committing crime over and over until they get caught.
Compounding that, audits aren't completely random. Those who cheat significantly on their taxes do so in order to claim little to no income every year. Tax authorities know this, and it's an easy pattern to spot. "Home based business with over $100,000 in revenue with less than $7K in profit for three years running" is an obvious group to do some audits on.
In short, people suck at evaluating risk.
Lot's of less expensive locations in this country than around San Francisco, in point of fact, aside from putting it in downtown Manhattan, it's hard to see how they could have done much worse. If you can't stand the heat, stay out of the kitchen. And look at all those parking lots! How much land could they have spared if they just put up a parking garage? Pretty sure they could find the funding . . .
You don't seem to get how city taxes work. If a city collect, say $1 billion from property taxes one year. If they collect $1 billion the next year, it means they didn't raise taxes. If every building in the city appreciated by 10% (which is never the case, some gain more value than others), then they should (and often do) lower the taxation rate to collect $1 billion instead of 1.1 billion.
Just because your house appreciate by 10% doesn't mean your taxes should increase. If the other houses got a 20% raise in value, your taxes should even go down.
I believe it was Tim Cook who stated âoeWe pay all the taxes we oweâ. As a long term Apple shareholder (1997), I think itâ(TM)s time Apple actually commits to the sentiment in that statement. Letâ(TM)s see some corporate responsibility and have Apple pay taxes back to the society that is fair and reasonable; stop letting the tax advisors silly games ruin your reputation.
Everything I've found says "the Chronicle reports that Apple replied with a $200 valuation". So "everything" is a single article in the Chronicle. A one-letter typo in that one article is entirely possible. I tried to find the actual appeal document but it doesn't seem to be available on line.
As I said, either way, in thr end they came up with a valuation around $387M. Which means the county's assessment was nearly three times the actual value.
Had this been Google rather Apple, they would have replied with a proposed valuation of Pi dollars.
If I were on the city counsel I'd claim Eminent domain on the property and offer 200% of their declared value for the property and then see what number they provide. It seems easy enough for a city to always offer that to anyone who doesn't like their assessment.
Ninjas don't carry tic tacs
Someone once proposed letting companies and people appraise their own buildings and houses for tax purposes.
The caveat is that this appraisal is now a for-sale price. If Apple appraised their HQ at $200 and I walked in with a pair of Franklins, I now own the building.
I was curious of online property tax for the new Apple campus in Cupertino, I found APN for that location 316-07-049 SCCtax webpage returns "No bills found for property 31607049 in fiscal year 2019." I did find this from https://www.sccassessor.org/in...
Current Information
Document No: 21115138 Document Type: GRANT DEED
Transfer Date: 3/18/2011 Tax Default Date: N/A
VALUE INFORMATION (Assessed Information as of 6/30/2018)
Real Property
Land: $439,402,436
Improvements: $398,600,000
Total: $838,002,436
Business
Fixtures: $0
Structure: $0
Personal Property: $0
Total: $0
Exemptions
Homeowner:$0
Other: $0
Total: $0
Net Assessed Value
Total: $838,002,436
mfwright@batnet.com
"Other assessors say large corporations are using their resources to hire attorneys and expert witnesses to eventually wear down county governments."
The sheriff would just padlock the doors til the tax bill was paid. Sometimes the old ways were better.
And if they're paying more than $200 per license, they're getting hosed!
Mimetics Inc. Twitter
The taxing authority is highballing with a lofty valuation to maximize revenue. This is just part of the negotiations you have to do over property taxes every couple of years in California to avoid getting screwed over.
It is also the county's biggest taxpayer, paying $56 million in the 2017-2018 tax year.
Let's see. Revenue of $229 billion for 2017 $.056 billion/ $229.23 billion = 0.02446% tax rate. Most individuals pay between 20-50% of their income (depending on the country). This is even more loony than the $200 campus. Can I buy your campus for $300 Apple -- you can make a 50% profit!
-- Political fascism requires a Fuhrer.
OK then. My house is worth $10. Now reduce my taxes! Also, as always: Fuck Apple
What the hell city are YOU in?
I heard that city manager of Plano, TX once proposed a rate decrease from 47.86 to 46.86.
Iâ(TM)ve contacted the author of SF Chronical article to ask what tax year and what buildings were involved. We donâ(TM)t have enough info on this to make an informed judgment.
Bus wheels are much larger than car wheels. If it was beating up the busses it was destroying cars.
The city roads were no doubt a joy. It took concrete economic power (the bus companies) for get the city government to put their faces out of all the free 'cocaine motor boats' they were getting and do their damn jobs.
John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
No.
Apple convinces people to give it money in return for products and services, thats fine.
The government takes a certain total amount of money to fund shared infrastructure in general, and that money needs to come from somewhere.
Every corporate using the lawyers to avoid paying such taxes means the general population in that area has to pay that money instead.
So that means Apple is directly using their legal muscle to force the other land owners in that area to pay more money to fund the additional
infrastructure that Apple enjoys the use of. Apple is in effect stealing from its neighbors.
Simple really, isnt it.
I know a couple landlords, and in their city, they describe property assessment as a big, corrupt game. The tax assessor always over-assesses. Property owners are compelled to fight the unreasonable assessment, generally using property lawyers. The tax fee is then reduced. The lawyers get paid, and donate heavily to the reelection campaigns of the tax officials.
Apple must contest, but the question is whether they should make an absurd lowball claim or a realistic one. I would say that depends on how reasonable the tax assessors are in Cupertino.
By the way, the article the summary linked is just tripe. The original article is here: https://www.sfchronicle.com/bu...
A cat can't teach a dog to bark.
Then instead of taxing Apple, the government should force them to sell the buildings to the IRS for $200. This shouldn't be a problem for them if the building is truly only worth $200...
In fact, make a law making it compulsory to offer anything for sale to the IRS at 20% more than its declared value for tax purposes. If people make honest declarations it won't be worth buying, but if the declaration is fraudulently low the IRS can buy the item and sell it for its true market value.
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This sounds like he tried, and SUCCEEDED! Unless you forgot to tell how he was subsequently audited, and had to pay a bunch of fines.
Worth 1 trillion dollars, then they need to be paying 1 billion in taxes. Even at that they are still not taxed very high! Holy Crap, pay up!
As a (former) public sector worker I accepted a lower rate of pay in exchange for very good pension when I retire. To suggest that tax payers have the right to rate on that contract because it is now inconvenient is evil; it's a breach of promise. If we're free to tear up our promises when they are no longer convenient, then the basis for society is largely gone, and certainly you can't expect your spouse to be faithful to you. Yes, going forward, public sector employers may be wise to alter the terms of their wage contract - but let's do it honestly, with pay rises for those losing pension rights.
OTOH I accept that unions have got legislators to agree pension rises as a way to pay their members more but without it appears on the books in the current financial year. However the idea that it's therefore right to claw that generosity back is to undermine any commitment to states being bound by contracts freely entered into. Yes, future pensions can be capped - but don't expect public sector workers not to strike to mark their resistance to a pay cut.
You also always under-assess if you're going to take property via eminent domain.
That's actually the right response for the council to make.
"Your building is worth only $200? Ok, here's $300, keep the change."
Every place I've ever lived charged for the convenient water delivery pipes, and the useful disposal pipes. I made the tax argument for not paying my utility bills.
Utility bills for water and sewer are in addition to taxes. Taxes don't fund that service at all.
Apple has a valid case. Municipalities in many areas have created a form of fraud via appraisal that they use to milk companies this way because they have been milking the public via overpaid politicians, employees, pensions, benefits etc.
One day it will collapse, Detroit fashion
From you...That is irony.
John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
Honest question since I don't live in the US and the states sales tax seems complicated in a 10 second google search: Don't you have any differentiation between essential items (food, water, milk, tissue paper, sanitary products, medical supplies, textbooks, etc) and luxury products for sales taxes?
A lot of countries do this where essential items get 0 or much lower sales tax. That way you can increase sales tax but not make things more difficult for the poor.
Sales tax policy varies enormously across the USA. It's not set at the federal level (not sure about US territories), but rather at state and local level. A few US states have no sales taxes, and some do not allow local modifications to sales tax, but many do allow these modifications. There are over 89,000 local and state governments in the USA (including counties, municipalities, townships and special districts such as school districts). Not all of these can tax independently, but many of them can so there still ends up being a lot of variation in sales taxes from place to place.
Worse, the sales tax rates and rules are not always set by zip code. You can also have multiple counties in a single zip code, each with their own sales tax policy. Or, you can be something like "everyone in the region bounded by the intersections of these n roads" pays this special sales tax for the next k years (in addition to any other state and local tax) as a result of some local referendum.
Sometimes services are taxed, sometimes they are not.
Dealing with sales tax can be a major pain for businesses, especially the ones that involve a lot of travel. For example, consider those businesses that travel to conventions or county fairs and sell goods. Also, there are many forms of work (like construction) that inherently tend to involve going where the work is. Most small business people who travel a lot - in my experience - really hate sales taxes.
In general, the sales tax problem not something that can be easily solved even with software. There are all kinds of special cases and exceptions written into the laws - the rules can get incredibly detailed and complicated. As most technical people know, natural language is ambiguous - and it often requires human judgement to decide what the rules actually say and whether or they are applicable in a given case. The rules often change from year to year, and attempts to simplify often run into opposition from special interest groups.
Many of the rich definitely make up one such special interest group - some are adversely affected by sales tax policy, but many LOVE having sales taxes, because every dollar in the government's budget that comes from a regressive tax is a dollar that doesn't come from a progressive tax - and thus a sales tax is effectively a tax break for the rich. In the USA the rich have a lot of influence, which is part of the reason why state and local taxes have gotten more regressive over the last few decades, which in turn has created problems with concentration of wealth.
Unfortunately, it is a fallacy that you can get "0 or lower sales tax" on "essential items" and "not make things more difficult for the poor". There is a fundamental problem here in defining what constitutes an essential item. For example, if you want social mobility, you need to give the poor access to educational materials, not just textbooks, but tools and other items needed to develop and practice skills (both in and out of school). That includes older-style tools such as carpentry tools or cooking supplies or power tools or welding equipment, and also modern tools such as computers, DVD players, televisions.
Once you start thinking this way, you begin to realize that many things that might be considered luxuries really aren't - something that might be a luxury might be a necessity to another. A boat, for example, can be a luxury to a rich person, or a necessity to a poor fisherman.
Another fundamental problem that you run into is the issue of
You pay for your usage, but the usage fee doesn't cover the pipes and equipment that actually get the water to your building, or the sewage away from it; much less the processing plant for the sewage to not just dump it into an otherwise clean waterway.
Maybe the usage fee should have all of that rolled into it; I have a feeling we'd just hear bitching and griping at that point about how much the water department is overcharging.
Slashdot still doesnâ(TM)t support Unicode after it was added to the HTML standard in 1997.
Well in 2015, Apple would not have any completed buildings or labs or equipment at Apple Park as their HQ and surrounding land was still under construction. For insurance purposes there is value in these things complete or not. For tax purposes, maybe the value is defaulted to a really low price.
Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.