[arvinjoar]

No matter the tax rate or how diligently one tries to fix loopholes, in a global world big corporations are going to dodge taxes (not always a bad thing). It's just that this is much harder for small companies who don't have armies of lawyers at their disposal, so it essentially creates an unfair advantage for bigger corporations (leverage) over startups and skews the economy towards the BigCo. This is why big corporations are often fine with regulations, higher taxes and raised minimum wages, because they know it will cement their market share. Just putting it out there, I find that it's often overlooked when discussing regulations, tax rates and so on.

[raganwald]

I’m reminded of an old poker saying: “The more wild cards and crazy rules, the better the expert’s advantage."

[raverbashing]

This is very true

What the "regulation fans" don't realize is that the bigger the company the more lawyers/accountants it can hire and work the cracks in the system.

This is also valid in the case of Starbucks. Regulation is increased for a reason, and the only company that has the resources to comply with it is Starbucks.

Regulation has to be simple, and in the case of transnational corporations, were country borders are mere a detail, increasing regulation will mean essentially nothing to the company and a loss of revenue to the country.

[astine]

This is true. It's also why some regulatory legistlation, such as Sarbox for example, applies differently to companies beneath and above a certain size.

[nikcub]

The more complex offshore structures take a lot of expert human effort and other capital costs to setup. To make them worthwhile requires a certain level of revenue, so it is usually only suited to medium-to-large sized businesses.

Apple and the other large companies can afford to keep the profit offshore. They are still paying full rates of tax on the revenue and profits they need to keep their businesses running.

When Apple pays a dividend, they will do it by paying full US tax rates on the dividend. Thus these tax structures are biased towards big companies only because they can afford to defer payments.

That said, all the knowledge that you need to setup a similar structure for a small business is available online and has become a lot cheaper. If you are accepting credit card payments you can setup in an offshore nation with a business registration, a bank account and a merchant account for a few thousand dollars.