Ireland says will not be U.S. "whipping boy" on tax

[dipsydoodle]

Source: Reuters

(Reuters) - Ireland's finance minister said the country would not be the "whipping boy" for what he called a flawed U.S. Senate report that said Irish loopholes helped technology giant Apple shrink its tax bill.

Ireland has been forced to defend its corporate tax rate after the Senate said on Monday that Apple paid little or no tax on tens of billions of dollars in profits channelled through Irish subsidiaries and that it had negotiated a special corporate tax rate of less than 2 percent.

While a cabinet colleague acknowledged on Wednesday that there needed to be a clampdown on multinationals shifting profits around the world to avoid tax, Michael Noonan went on the attack, telling senators they had got their sums wrong.

In an angry exchange at a parliamentary committee meeting, the finance minister accused a fellow legislator of putting the jobs of people in the country at risk by repeating the Senate committee's claims.

Read more: http://uk.reuters.com/article/2013/05/22/uk-ireland-tax-idUKBRE94L0G620130522

[Xipe Totec]

1. The term is redheaded stepchild. nt

[cuncator]

2. What jobs?

"Putting the jobs of people in the country at risk" is a load of rubbish almost as large as trickle down economics. The only jobs it will affect are the lawyers putting together the shell corporations.

[area51]

6. Welcome to DU. n/t

[dipsydoodle]

7. No - not just lawyers

Apple, Google, Facebook, HP, IBM, LinkedIn, PayPal and Cisco Systems all announced new hiring sprees in 2012, while DropBox, Aspen, Clearstream and Twitter invested in the country for the first time. Over 4,000 jobs were created in the information and communications technology sector last year, according to IDA Ireland.

http://news.efinancialcareers.com/135411/as-finance-falters-in-ireland-google-and-apple-help-create-4000-jobs/

That's just 2012. I'm not excusing the situation - I'm explaining it. The Irish government used the low rate to attract investment which would create jobs.

[RunInCircles]

8. 4000 Stop the presses

Hiring sprees produced 4,000 whole jobs OMG!
Stop the presses this must make everything OK!
I can't imagine that you write this stuff without asking yourself wtf only 4000 who is the sucker?

[dipsydoodle]

9. In a 12 month period that's significant in the case of the Republic of Ireland.

whose total population is only 4.6 million. That's c. half the size of the population of London for comparison where it would be regarded as being equally significant.

[JackInGreen]

12. Unfortunately for my Irish cousins

Tough titty, they had enough problems with their golden circle, this is just one more chicken come home to roost where I hope the legislature and corporate interests pay, but more's the pity, the workers will be punished for the misdeeds of a few legislators and the greedy.

[Iliyah]

3. Yeah, its BS

Last edited Wed May 22, 2013, 11:24 PM - Edit history (1)

if corporations paid their fair share of the taxes the country would be bouncing back quicker. But oh noes, GREED and selfishness.

[Amonester]

4. And what is Ireland then, profiting from taxes on earned profits overseas?

A pirate?

[DallasNE]

5. The Race To The Bottom

This article shows how ruthless international companies are. Either you grant them the tax avoidance they want or they shop around until they find someone willing to give you the free tax ride. And the money never leaves the Nevada bank it has been parked in the whole while. Does anyone really think that some of that money doesn't get tossed over the wall, making its way into domestic accounts and used to pay executive bonuses, etc. It's just that there is so much of it they can't do it fast enough and still escape discovery. I'll bet Apple even shopped around for banks willing to give them what they demanded and a Nevada bank won the prize.

[toby jo]

10. So we need a collective global watch.

Like the one we need on labor & the environment.

Money gets away from us faster than we can make it behave.

Jobs argument is bogus. Tax money would create jobs, demand, and shut down corporate gasbags.

[dipsydoodle]

11. The specific issue here is the Republic of Ireland

No deal - no investment. So where in this instance would the extra tax money come from ?