Free Republic

SUMMARY Since the late '80s, Apple and other US multinationals have used Irish tax law to shield overseas profits from taxation by the EU or the US. The European Union has declared the Irish tax arrangements illegal and asserts that Apple now owes $14.5 billion in “back taxes”. The US Treasury Department believes that the EU claim is an unjustified attempt to grab tax revenue it would receive from repatriation of Apple's overseas cash. The executive arm of the European Union (EU), the European Commission , has decided that Apple received illegal tax breaks from Ireland. The EC is now...

NEW YORK - By employing strategies known to lawyers as the "Double Irish" and the "Dutch Sandwich," Google cut its taxes by $3.1 billion in the past three years - moving most of its foreign profit through Ireland and the Netherlands to Bermuda. Google's income shifting helped reduce its overseas tax rate to 2.4 percent, the lowest of the top five U.S. technology companies by market capitalization, according to regulatory filings in six countries. "It's remarkable that Google's effective rate is that low," said Martin Sullivan, a tax economist with Tax Analysts. "We know this company operates throughout the world...