I love it. Apple gets to avoid paying taxes for years through accounting slight of hand, and then when they finally pay for part of what they owe they want a pat on the back for doing so. Corporations, man.
You only owe the taxes that the law compels you to pay. There's no obligation whatsoever to pay a dime more.
Do you personally look to pay the maximum amount of taxes that you could possibly justify through various readings of the tax code? Because I guarantee that your tax software or your tax accountant are not "taking advantage" of opportunities for you to pay more unless you look to.
do you pay your state government the sales tax you owe it for all of your online purchases?
I made this mistake when I first starting selling online, which stung. Setting up a tax ID in Canada was very easy. Now that I am selling in the US, I am just beginning to explore the issue, and it is notably less easy.
So if you "get away" with not paying sales tax online, it is likely that the sales tax was simply baked into the price.
here's a little page from washington state on it, which matches my understanding of the situation in most other states: https://dor.wa.gov/get-form-or-publication/publications-subj...
> Have you ever made a retail purchase and the invoice didn’t include retail sales tax? This may occasionally occur, especially if you purchase items over the internet or from out-of-state vendors. ... However, the buyer has a responsibility to pay use tax to the Department of Revenue even if the seller doesn’t collect it.
> Also, an invoice should never have a single figure that “includes retail sales tax.” If you receive such an invoice, contact the vendor and ask for a new invoice with the retail sales tax separately stated. Washington law requires that customer sales slips, contracts, invoices or other sales documents separately state the amount of retail sales tax due.
If there is a poorer argument against wrongdoing than this I don't know it.
If the law allowed me to set up a company facade so that I could keep more of the money that I earn, I'd do so in a heartbeat.
For apple, the effort is worth the benefit. For you, it may not be.
Apple has done nothing illegal. If you don’t like it, you can complain about the tax laws, that’s what is bothering you.
A huge part of their $250B stash have never been taxed at all.
http://fortune.com/2013/05/20/meet-aoi-apples-mysterious-iri...
>Apple expects to invest over $30 billion in capital expenditures in the US over the next five years and create over 20,000 new jobs through hiring at existing campuses and opening a new one.
All of this is discretionary spending.
Shareholder primacy is a theory -- though it's really more of an ideology -- that executives/board members can believe in, but it is by no means required by law[1].
>A business corporation is organized and carried on primarily for the profit of the stockholders. The powers of the directors are to be employed for that end. The discretion of directors is to be exercised in the choice of means to attain that end, and does not extend to a change in the end itself, to the reduction of profits, or to the non-distribution of profits among stockholders in order to devote them to other purposes...
It's not the only interpretation however
>Dodge is often misread or mistaught as setting a legal rule of shareholder wealth maximization. This was not and is not the law. Shareholder wealth maximization is a standard of conduct for officers and directors, not a legal mandate. The business judgment rule [which was also upheld in this decision] protects many decisions that deviate from this standard. This is one reading of Dodge. If this is all the case is about, however, it isn't that interesting.
>A business corporation is organized and carried on primarily for the profit of the stockholders. The powers of the directors are to be employed for that end. The discretion of directors is to be exercised in the choice of means to attain that end, and does not extend to a change in the end itself, to the reduction of profits, or to the non-distribution of profits among stockholders in order to devote them to other purposes...
You could have researched that one pretty easily:
https://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate/2015/04/16/what-are-co...
https://medium.com/bull-market/there-is-no-effective-fiducia...
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/harold-meyerson-the-...
https://www.quora.com/Taxes-To-what-extent-are-U-S-companies...
Many shareholders care about stability, There is the whole distinction between "growth" stocks and "income" stocks. Some investors prefer low-growth companies that pay big dividends, other investors prefer just the opposite.
Some investors care about environmental issues, or social issues, or religious issues. e.g. the Norwegian sovereign wealth fund divests from companies that don't meet its ethical objectives, and is often a significant investor.
Simple. "It's in our shareholders' best interest to have a stable society with upwards mobility so more people can buy our products over time."
Or, "It's in our shareholders' best interest for us not to act so amorally as to turn public opinion against us, incurring new onerous regulations as a result."