[wkat4242]

They should really tune down the tax breaks too though. They're basically screwing the rest of Europe by allowing these companies to avoid taxes in the whole EU. Just for a few measly jobs (even Apple only has a few thousand employees in return for literally billions of revenue going through the country). https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2020/sep/25/european-...

That money could really have been put to good use in the EU. The EU should present a more united front here IMO instead of allowing companies to cherry pick countries and make them compete against each other for the lowest tax rates.

Cory Doctorow had a good article about it a few days ago: https://pluralistic.net/2023/05/15/finnegans-snooze/#dirty-o...

[robertlagrant]

> They're basically screwing the rest of Europe by allowing these companies to avoid taxes in the whole EU

The EU was designed to allow countries to compete on this.

> That money could really have been put to good use in the EU

I really think this is a controversial statement. The money can be put to good use in Ireland as well, which is in the EU.

[wkat4242]

> The EU was designed to allow countries to compete on this.

Yeah but it shouldn't have been I think. When the EU was 'designed' there was still very strong nationalism and countries were afraid of giving up their sovereignty, it's time to start moving away from this.

> I really think this is a controversial statement. The money can be put to good use in Ireland as well, which is in the EU.

Yes but Ireland isn't getting a lot of money because of the huge tax breaks they provide. The main thing they get in return is a few jobs (and the taxes paid by the employees).

The EU as a whole would gain much more if countries were not able to compete on taxes. Ireland itself might lose out some but the EU overall would gain a lot because there would be a lot less tax avoidance.

[robertlagrant]

> there was still very strong nationalism

Well, from a taxation perspective this is still a key issue. People want their nations to get tax money from international corporations. They are extremely nationalist in this sense.

> the EU overall would gain a lot

I don't think this is an automatic good at all. The EU bodies might gain some money, perhaps even enough to move the EU Parliament a few more times in the year, lovely for the not important EU administrative employees, but that will also result in higher prices for the important people: EU citizens.

[dbspin]

Just to lend an Irish perspective. This is not necessarily popular here. Our governments move to sue to prevent having Apple pay 16 billion in tax evasion fines (to Ireland), was extremely unpopular - https://www.bbc.com/news/business-53416206

Just as in the US, there's growing suspicion of the pseudo economic growth that an economy constructed around construction and providing tax avoidance opportunities to big-tech provides. We have one of the worst housing crises in Europe, massive economic inequality, cost of living increases, enormous and growing issues with homelessness and street heroin abuse and so on. Many of which directly track with how the economy has responded to tech firms setting up here.

Meanwhile we don't have the resources for the state to engage in the massive housing construction thats sorely need as our population grows, solve our urban congestion issues, invest in public transport etc.

It's been a terrible deal for Ireland, and the country is in many ways a worse place to live than it was fifteen years ago - during the 'great recession'.

[injb]

It's not clear that it's necessary for the state to engage in housing construction. There's plenty of money for people to pay for houses. But there has been no building for the last decade while the population has exploded.

Why not? People who have land don't want to sell it, and they don't have to. But neither can they build on it because it's trivially easy to stop any building project by objecting.

So you have one group of people holding on to land like their lives depended on it, trying to increase the value, and another group trying to lower the value of that land and increase the value of their own homes by preventing the owners from building on it.

[wkat4242]

> There's plenty of money for people to pay for houses.

Well, you really have to mortgage yourself to the hilt to buy a house now in Ireland, it's ridiculous. With a single normal (non-director etc) wage it's almost impossible.

> So you have one group of people holding on to land like their lives depended on it, trying to increase the value, and another group trying to lower the value of that land and increase the value of their own homes by preventing the owners from building on it.

I was told that when the republic was founded land ownership was forbidden (or public or something) to avoid this very thing? But this was a pretty 'severe' person, maybe they were bending the truth. I don't know.

But the objection system is crazy yes. It doesn't explain though how Ireland was one big building site before the credit crisis and now nothing is being built.

The whole country (outside Dublin) is one big empty space and yet houses in such shortage that the prices are extreme :( There's more than enough space for everyone to live comfortably and affordably.

Also, I don't really agree that having houses nearby would decrease the value of the existing ones. Houses in urban areas are generally much more expensive than those in backwater villages. And a lot of people prefer to live in urban areas. In fact this is one of the reasons I left the country. Outside Dublin every town is way too small to have decent services and Dublin is way too expensive to live there.

[dbspin]

>There's plenty of money for people to pay for houses. But there has been no building for the last decade while the population has exploded.

Alas that money is not in the hands of those who need them.

I'd suggest that it is absolutely clear that it is essential for the state to build and provide housing, given that there is a massive crisis which the market is utterly incapable of addressing.

[disgruntledphd2]

What you are saying used to be true, but is not true anymore. In fact 20% of all Irish tax revenue is corporate tax, paid mostly by the ten largest tech and pharma companies.

[duggan]

Ireland was one of the poorest countries in Europe 30 years ago. Explicit government policy encouraging foreign investment has made it one of the wealthiest.

I don't think Ireland needs to apologise for this; it's a small island nation that choked under colonialism for centuries. When people from former empires, with huge populations and access to continent-spanning infrastructure complain that Ireland is "taking advantage" of them, it strikes me as sour grapes at best.

[xamolxix]

> When people from former empires

What about when people who were under the boot of empires (which is a substantial part of the people of the EU) complain about it?

> it strikes me as sour grapes at best

It's a legit complaint. No one can change the behaviors of previous generations but they can attempt chaining the behavior of current ones.

[duggan]

To be clear, I'm not talking about how it sucked for the Irish a hundred years ago. I'm talking about the country's latent economic disadvantage from being historically impoverished.

If you're in a former empire, you can take advantage of the infrastructure and wealth built by that empire today. You get the roads, rail, architecture, city planning, industry. It hardly seems mentioning but most other countries also have significant natural resources or agricultural output with Europe-wide protected status for various industries and products.

You are also capable of driving, getting a train, or bus to any other European country. You have infrastructure built to handle millions upon millions of people.

Probably better weather too.

Look, I'm not saying Ireland is some sort of woebegone backwater but you have to understand it is a small country with limited natural resources that's more awkward to travel to than its neighbours. It has to do what it can to compete.

[xamolxix]

Sure, I'm just saying the countries from the former soviet block and possibly others weren't in the empire business.

[roomey]

What is with this "handful" of jobs line that he seem to be pushing about tech in Ireland? Does he not realise what a small population Ireland is?

Tech is a massive employer in Ireland, it also creates a bunch of other service related jobs.

Fighting an uphill battle here I guess. Tax haven Ireland, taking money from the "poor" EU.

[lifeonlars]

Perhaps you don't understand the situation. Ireland is certainly a tax haven, and the number of jobs in Ireland created by the tax arrangements are trivial compared to the amount of business that flows through Ireland on paper. Most of the tech companies which have their 'European headquarters' in Dublin have their real HQs and most of their employees in other EU countries or in the UK.

The fact that tech in general is a relatively large and important employer in Ireland is neither here nor there.

[roomey]

I do understand, but the fact that tech is a massive employer in Ireland is absolutely relevent.

Also, I'm not sure why you think most tech companies with their HQs in Ireland don't have significant presence here?

For example, Google, Microsoft, AWS, Apple, Facebook, tiktok, linkedin,intel, ibm, oracle, dell even SAP. These are literally off the top of my head from the tech jobs Ive seen on linked in over the last while.

Now think of all the non-tech roles, all the accountants, sales, HR, tax people. There is a locus of skill sets, within a very small area, in an English speaking, European country.

I meant claiming that these tech companies are just brass plate operations just aren't true, they are a huge part of our economy.

Talk to someone from Cork and there is a good chance they know (like a family member) who had worked in Apple or EMC at some point!

[lifeisstillgood]

Ireland was one of the signatories to Yellands global minimum Corp tax of 15%.

Yeah being at 15% sucks compared to where other european companies sit, but the race to the bottom got cut off. it's a win

[wkat4242]

Yes but these companies don't pay that 15%. They all get special deals paying pretty much nothing. That's what that ongoing lawsuit is about by the EU against Apple. They're still trying to get almost 14 billion euro paid.

[smugma]

11%, below the Irish rate of 12.5%

https://amp.theguardian.com/technology/2023/apr/09/profits-a...

[throwawaymobule]

everywhere else in the EU also signed it, and the corporate tax rate wasn't even the lowest in the EU already. (Bulgaria was lower, and another eurozone country was tied)

[negamax]

It's by design. These companies can't pull this in any other EU country. Ireland was a relatively poor country 20 years ago. And is showered with money since then for its membership to the EU.

Right question to ask is why did Germany, France allowed it. May be they foresaw that this was the only way to keep Ireland in the union or to get these companies in EU at the first place.

[smugma]

13B in question for 6K jobs => 2M per job

[throwawaymobule]

I think it's a little more than that, if you include other staff not in their Cork campus.

Also important: Enterprise Ireland (EI, the ones doing most of the work on turnkey tax-minimization) is a semi-private company, and is graded based on business development, and not tax revenue.