“My message to those companies is you are fighting the wrong battle”.
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Germany and Austrian finance ministers, Wolfgang Schauble and Hans-Jorg Schelling, confirmed their tax authorities are investigating the Apple case, but Mr Schauble expressed scepticism that any money would flow back to Germany and said Ms Vestager’s invitation to other countries was “mysterious”. The recent shock multi-billion euro tax demand on Apple AAPL.O was part of that trend.
“You need to pay your taxes in a fair way”. This byzantine situation undermines not only USA tax efficiency but also US tax fairness: American companies whose business models do not create opportunities to play the overseas taxation game get stuck with a disproportionate share of the tab for government services that benefit the corporate sector as a whole.
EU finance ministers are lining up behind an EU Commission ruling that technology giant Apple owes billions of euros because it didn’t pay the proper tax in the European Union for more than a decade.
Pierre Moscovici told a meeting of eurozone finance ministers yesterday that the commission was not politically motivated in ordering Dublin to recoup €13 billion in back taxes from Apple. Ministers for economic and financial affairs gather for a two-day informal meeting in the Slovak capital, where they will discuss BREXIT, EU economic policies and the migration crisis.
Spain is also keen to talk to other countries – such as the Netherlands, Belgium and Luxembourg – that use “tax rulings”, or clarifications, for companies on their national tax bills.
The Commission will also brief ministers on plans to set up a common corporate tax base and a single European blacklist for tax havens, in a further effort to counter tax avoidance and make companies pay taxes where they generate profits.
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“Today, this House has an opportunity to send a strong message that we stand together in challenging the presentation that the Commission has made, and that we are all determined that Ireland should continue to be at the forefront in efforts to improve and reform the global tax system”. European regulators recently determined that Apple must fork over more than $14 billion as a result of having received in “illegal tax benefits”.
