[valuearb]

It's not silly, just dumb. A foreign company that wants to deposit billions in your countries banks without any other services in return is an immense benefit to your country. Trying to tax them for it on top is short sighted and greedy.

[dragonwriter]

A lot of the foreign-for-tax-purposes funds of US corps is held in US bank accounts in the name of the foreign subsidiary of the US parent. It's not doing any particular good for the economy that is the legal home of the subsidiary except to the extent that it is taxes there.

[valuearb]

Not all of it. Even if Apple is only keeping 1% in Ireland, that's a few billion that Ireland banks wouldn't have had otherwise. What's the Keynsian multiplier on that?