Sewell said Apple paid $400 million in corporate income taxes in Ireland in 2014. The evaluation will however, not look at the island nation’s 12.5 percent corporate tax rate, which is one of the smallest in the West. The president of the European Commission highlighted the conflict by calling for the summit to take action. It’s in our competence to set the rates and no bridgehead by any commissioner is going to change that.
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They have their European headquarters in Ireland for the tax benefits while providing tens of thousands of jobs. “I have raised the issue that the pattern of the action appears to be highly focused on USA firms”.
The Competition Commission is not only investigating Apple.
Deputy Doherty also said comments from Apple CEO Tim Cook on Morning Ireland this morning are completely at odds with his testimony at the US Senate hearings in 2013.
The tax bill is not only causing concerns in Ireland and Europe. But Mr. Dijsselbloem said there was no need for a transatlantic “tax war”, and called for the strengthening of worldwide standards. Juncker’s remarks appeared created to reassure United States lawmakers, who have argued for years over the treatment of offshore income but now fear that the EC move would mean more profits earned by U.S. corporations flowing into European tax coffers.
After a meeting on Friday morning, the Irish cabinet agreed to join Apple and legally challenge the EC’s ruling. Read on, to know more about why the European Union is calling out Apple.
Apple is telling its Tame Apple Press, and its “lobbied” U.S. politicians, that the EU is targeting it as part of an anti-American campaign inspired by those nasty communist Europeans. The commission denied that allegation.
Minister for Disability Iss-ues Finian McGrath said the Independent Alliance was “satisfied” with the outcome and “everybody has to pay their fair share of tax”.
The White House has also raised concerns that the European ruling will undermine tax cooperation.
Apple and Ireland are both expected to appeal against any decision which rules that the highly competitive tax breaks that Dublin offered to the Silicon Valley giant amounted to illegal state aid.
Mr. Dijsselbloem is in conflict with the commission over its ruling in October a year ago that the Netherlands, where he is finance minister, offered a sweetheart deal to coffee chain Starbucks Corp. that amounted to an illegal subsidy.
Apple plans to appeal against the European Commission’s ruling, and said it sincerely hoped that the Irish government would do so too.
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Dan Friedell adapted this story for Learning English based on reports by VOANews.com and Reuters.
