The New York Times is reporting that by routing huge amounts of income through low-tax places like Nevada, Ireland, Luxembourg and the British Virgin Islands, Apple probably avoided paying $US2.4 billion dollars in US taxes last year alone. That’s billion, with a B.
Shock News! OK, not really. It’s a bit of a tired cliché to decry that we’re paying too much for our gadgets at retail (even though many of us are buying online anyway), but it looks as though something might actually be happening about it. Albeit only maybe, and only slowly.
I’m married and my wife works, too. We don’t have kids. We’ll miss out on most of Julia Gillard’s tax sweeteners for breeders and singles. According to the government’s new Household Assistance Estimator, the Carbon Tax will cost us roughly $905 per year; our offset will be just $306. Bloody hell. Try it yourself and see how you fare. Either way, we’ll all pay at least $3.30 per week more for electricity from July 1, 2012.
An audit report [PDF]conducted by the US Treasury Inspector reveals that 2200 IRS databases were considered vulnerable to potential cyberattack.
At the end of June, a bill will be floated at Capitol Hill, proposing Amazon start collecting sales tax from its customers. Meaning, in essence, that online shopping could become more expensive.
Obama dominated the tech angle of the ’08 election with his smartphone-packing social media swagger (his opponent not knowing how to use a computer helped too). But The Economist says some in the tech business now feel abandoned.
