This one frustrated me to read, i think they should have gotten involved sooner and worked with google. Instead they slap a crazy high fee for something that is vague in violation. It does feel a bit like a vendetta here by the EU.
I don't see why EU should "work with google" to make them follow regulations (EDIT: beyond the threat of punishment).
The commission and national (European) regulators are investigating ~150 cases every year, most of which none of us will ever have heard of.
http://ec.europa.eu/competition/ecn/statistics.html#2
The ones I know about have all been the result of a complaint made by competitors. I would be surprised if the regulator could selectively reject such complaints without good reason.
Who else do you think they should pursue instead?
We can prosecute equally for jaywalking, but anti-competitive behavior gets worse the bigger the offender is and/or the worse offense they commit. So in that way it makes sense to prosecute "top-down", that is go after the biggest ones first.
That's at least what I prefer as an EU member state citizen and consumer.
Following that logic, the same applies to law in general. Should we therefore abolish law?
On looking into the judgement however it appeared as though both parties actively sought to subvert competition rules under a disingenuous "veil of ignorance". Warning shots had been fired earlier but the practices continued hence the fine.
I haven't read into the details of this judgement yet but you may well find similar reasoning therein.
While it's certainly Apple's prerogative to play EU states off against each other to get the best deal, it should have been blindingly obvious that what it was getting from Ireland would be, and should be reversed.
> it should have been blindingly obvious
and yet, it took a deep-dive investigation by the commission with a team of specialists to untangle it.
And blindingly obvious to Apple, the benefactor.
When somebody says, "Hey come and do your stuff here, we'll only charge you 0.005% corp tax!" you should expect that their wider financial governing body (who is losing out severely because of a deal like that) might have something to say about it.
You saw that thing in the ICIJ Jersey papers leak where Apple went round the world actively seeking jurisdictions that would twist their tax rules to suit them?
https://www.irishtimes.com/business/apple-s-cash-mountain-ho...
I'm saying that when you get a deal this good —however you ended up there— you should not be surprised when it turns out that it was illegal.
Of course Apple shopped around. But if somebody offered to sell you $20 bills for half a cent each, would you suspect something dodgy? That's the scale of the issue here.
It's bleedingly obvious that it's illegal to be taxed differently than other companies. Paying back €13bn is nothing.
Companies that "make deals" on tax anywhere in the world should be effectively banned from the EU market. It's pure evil. Or pay 10x of any gain they have made anywhere in the world by "making deals" on tax, thereby undercutting fair competition in a free market.
But saying "hey, that's obviously corruption" isn't enough. We need a good way to restructure tax collection so that the right people get it.
Multinationals paying Luxembourg (Paypal, eBay) or Ireland (Apple, Amazon) for all revenue and operations from the entire EU is wrong, no? How do you fix that?
The particular problem with the EU is that it's a system of "good faith" agreements that has until quite recently been quite weak against cynical attacks.
This kind of dealing undermines the spirit of the EU accords and you can expect it to be dealt with in the course of time - probably through tax harmonisation, which wouldn't then be a million miles away from the american model.
You are not supposed to be able to get special privileges to your company to the detriment of your competitors.
There can be no free market when justice (and thus taxation) is not blind.
Capitalism is a perfectly good system of economics and I look forward to seeing it in place some day.
This is just a drop in the ocean for the total amount of wealth that is protected with these schemes. In the $20 for ¢0.5 picture this probably amounts to ¢50. They're still making off with the other $19.49. Though arbitration would probably round that up.
An acceptable loss.
"The Irish government agreed a deal with Apple in 1991 to only tax a certain bracket of its earnings" http://uk.businessinsider.com/how-apple-managed-to-get-its-t...
To me it's pretty obvious that Tim Cook will burn in hell :-).
Though tax avoidance was a corporate strategy and they actually sought these deals it would not have been obvious that this was technically illegal. The Irish Revenue Commissioners told them it was legal as an interpretation of Irish law, which was incorrect.
It certainly IS NOT. When Apple "get's a deal" it is by definition market manipulation. You're not supposed to "get a deal" regarding taxation!
The same taxation rules must apply to every company or else there is illegal subsidy. The whole idea around "making a deal" on tax is horrendous anti-capitalist BS.
It's exactly the same as "making a deal" wrt the law in a corrupt country. A corporation "making a deal" by having government look away when they do something illegal, or getting their competitors fined on dubious charges.
Apple, Google, Microsoft, and basically all of those companies ARE THE SCUM OF THE EARTH for not refusing do to business with the market-corrupting Irish Republic.
What makes you think that they didn't? Have you even read the WSJ article? It says:
"Google, which can appeal any decision, has rejected the EU’s case since the bloc issued formal charges over two years ago."
You are assuming that Google is a poor layman that is accidentally breaking laws. Indeed Google has an army of lawyers and they know precisely well the risk of their actions.
If I went out into the street and 'keyed' someone's status symbol car then I would not be in trouble until someone decided to do something about the crime.
The owner might not be pleased and, pressured by the insurance company, might get the police to go through CCTV and finally find me caught in the act.
Alternatively, a neighbour or passer by might just call the cops on me whilst I 'brazenly commit the deed'.
Either way, unless there is a report of wrong-doing then I would be getting away with it, not having to be fined etc. The police don't just sit there idly looking through the rule book looking what they can nick me for, someone would have to bring matters to their attention.
And that is the problem with this EU ruling. Nobody I know has bought a phone, decided to write to their MP (or MEP) and complained about not having Bing! as their default search engine. The EU don't accept complaints from little people like that anyway.
So what has gone on here is that some group of lobbyists have sought out some money from the Microsofts of this world, invariably to setup some fake pressure group, to bring on this legal action. With previous history, e.g. bundling in Windows, the modus operandi was the same, albeit with Netscape being the whinging ninnys.
Whwn the story finally hits the press the parasitical legal firm, the fake consumer group and who fronted the cash to pay for the action get forgotten, instead debate concerns whether the E.U. is a load of rubbish, being as silly as when they banned bent bananas and had wine lakes or whether Google have been truly evil.
In The Emperors New Clothes the people that sold the expensive invisible thread leave the story so in the final act there is just the stupidity of the crowd and the stupidity of the Emperor, story facilitated by the boy. Similarly here, the people that have wreaked this carnage have left the story a long time ago.
Fining Google 4 billions after they forced all sort of lock-in strategies on the users for a decade is less than a slap on the wrists.
Although, they should have put a fine of $12b (all of googles yearly earnings), effective immediate, and double it every year until non competitive practices ended.