blitz1

applesauce007 said:

big brother 84 said:

I listened to Tim Cook trying to defend Apple's pitifully low tax rate on the BBC news this morning and it just sounded bad. Very bad PR. Attacking the EU is very unwise. All the people whose businesses pay tax at 20% are looking at this and saying why should Apple pay tax at less than 1%.
As a life-long Apple evangelist, even I find this Apple hard to swallow.

Fuck the EU.
Ireland set its tax laws and Apple abided by them and greatly benefitted the country in the process.
The most Ireland can do now is change their law but asking for back taxes is pure bullshit

Fuck the companies that choose to pay 20% when 12% and lower is available them in Ireland.
If these companies are too stupid or too lazy to take advantage of it then I say fuck them.  This is a competitive global economy and the EU is clearly not ready for it.

The US government and American companies should target the EU back, hit them hard enough to get them dissolved.  To hell with any consequences to be fixed later.
The EU is an ill conceived organization managed by idiots that should not exist.  The world would be better without them.

phone-ui-guy said:

How long before Ireland is going to be out of the EU due to Brexit? If they get out of the EU before this is settled, Ireland will just drop it.

apple ][ said:

SpamSandwich said:

Perhaps Apple could get an even better deal than with the backstabbing Irish and move their European operations to England instead now? No more harmonized tax rates to abide by, I'm sure Britain will be eager to attract LOTS of big businesses (and with that lower priced Pound too)!

Good idea!

England would make a great base for European Operations.

One other positive outcome for Apple when the EU finally disintegrates, is no more ridiculous EU commissions or EU Jihads and EU lawsuits against Apple.

freerange said:

austriacus said:

ChampionPower said:

ALL:

Perhaps this is yet another good reason (that of national sovereignty) to leave the EU!     If this realstionship and deal is good enough for Ireland the Apple then that should be the end of the matter.   The EU does not provide Ireland with 6,000 jobs like Apple does, so if I were Ireland I'd simply refuse to abide by their decision!  What the hell can they do?  Expel Ireland from the EU?  That would be a blessing and a death warrant to the lazy bureaucrats in the EU in Brussels.

This is not about sovereignty - like any member of the EU Ireland is obliged to play by the rules. They say that you cannot give a special deal to one organisation and not to others. The general tax rate of about 12 or so percent is already pretty low - tell me how much they would have to pay in the US? Apple with its highly paid lawyers must have known from the very beginning that they were breaking EU rules. Now they have to pay back the illegal tax subsidies

Oh please, what absolute crap! Let's talk about Airbus and all the government financial support, tax breaks and financing subsidies to purchasers. What a bunch of hypocrites! 

Soli said:

AdBrit said:

In the end, all this is Apple trying to avoid paying taxes, something all of us do compliantly without begging for exception. Apple and other Corporations are simply moochers of a countries wealth whether that be the consumer's dollars or the consumer's labour. They are transient welfare bums.

What should a corporation do? Pay taxes beyond what they are legally obligated to pay in order to appease you? I certainly have accountants looking for every possible way I can reduce how much I legally owe the gov't. You don't do that?