Shane Ross: Reduce Corporation Tax to 9.9%

hmmm

Scofflaw wrote: »

Unfortunately, the beal bocht looks a little less convincing when you're the second wealthiest country by GDP/capita in the EU. Even adjusting for GNP rather than GDP, we're still richer than France, or Spain, or Italy - and GNP isn't quite right, because we do tax the GNP-GDP gap.

I'm sure someone has also pointed out to Kenny that he is still paid more than most EU Prime Ministers. We are in there negotiating for a bailout because we are still spending too much on ourselves, I'm not surprised he has been told to take a hike and stop being ridiculous.

ei.sdraob

hmmm wrote: »

I'm disappointed with Ross, this suggestion is like something out of a playground and not something a grown-up should consider. It's all very well for SF and the ULA to shout out mindless slogans, I expect more from Ross.

Merkel and Sarcozy have done a good job at reducing european politics into a playground where they are the 2 bullies. Whatever happened to solidarity and not interfering with our taxes.

hmmm

ei.sdraob wrote: »

Merkel and Sarcozy have done a good job at reducing european politics into a playground where they are the 2 bullies. Whatever happened to solidarity and not interfering with our taxes.

Solidarity? We are begging for money so we can continue to have some of the highest social welfare rates and richest public servants in Europe. It's like the rich neighbour begging the poorer neighbours for money so he can continue to put truffles on his plate.

We don't have to take European money if we lived within our means. We can politely decline their offer and conditions at any time.

ei.sdraob

hmmm wrote: »

Solidarity? We are begging for money so we can continue to have some of the highest social welfare rates and richest public servants in Europe. It's like the rich neighbour begging the poorer neighbours for money so he can continue to put truffles on his plate.

We don't have to take European money if we lived within our means. We can politely decline their offer and conditions at any time.

You are half correct

public/welfare expenses did go out of control and have nowhere near been addressed, ive plenty of posts/threads on subject here

but good chunk of that "bailout" is for the banks not to keep the country running, dont forget that

edwinkane

hmmm wrote: »

I'm disappointed with Ross, this suggestion is like something out of a playground and not something a grown-up should consider. It's all very well for SF and the ULA to shout out mindless slogans, I expect more from Ross.

In life, I've invariably found that when one doesn't have an argument, one ends up calling names and hurling abuse as a smokescreen for the lack of argument.

Dionysus

hmmm wrote: »

I'm disappointed with Ross, this suggestion is like something out of a playground and not something a grown-up should consider. It's all very well for SF and the ULA to shout out mindless slogans, I expect more from Ross.

In fairness to Ross, I've never got the impression from him that he'd shed a tear if Ireland left the EU and was back under the British "sphere of influence" (to be euphemistic about it). He has always been much more at home in that cultural milieu, and been honest about it. I believe he at least once described himself as a "Southern unionist".

While I have a degree of respect for his criticisms of the economic situation - I'd probably have more if he weren't writing for the rag that is the Irish/Sunday Independent - I have little trust that his views on the EU are motivated by a sense of patriotism (in the positive sense) to the idea of an independent sovereign Ireland.

irishh_bob

Mr. Loverman wrote: »

But it also makes our exports cheaper, and we are one of the world's largest exporters.

Look at Germany, they are booming because of the weak Euro.

euro is strong right now

Scofflaw

ei.sdraob wrote: »

Solidarity? We are begging for money so we can continue to have some of the highest social welfare rates and richest public servants in Europe. It's like the rich neighbour begging the poorer neighbours for money so he can continue to put truffles on his plate.

We don't have to take European money if we lived within our means. We can politely decline their offer and conditions at any time.

You are half correct

public/welfare expenses did go out of control and have nowhere near been addressed, ive plenty of posts/threads on subject here

but good chunk of that "bailout" is for the banks not to keep the country running, dont forget that

To make it fully correct, then - a richer neighbour begging his poorer neighbours for money to keep putting truffles on his plate and cover his pal's gambling losses. It was the Irish government that decided to absorb the Irish banks' debts, after all.

cordially,
Scofflaw

ei.sdraob

Scofflaw wrote: »

To make it fully correct, then - a richer neighbour begging his poorer neighbours for money to keep putting truffles on his plate and cover his pal's gambling losses. It was the Irish government that decided to absorb the Irish banks' debts, after all.

cordially,
Scofflaw

The poorer neighbours wouldn't have a banking system now if we didnt decide to be good europeans, and as you know well unlike yourself i was very vocal against giving anything to the banks, and calling Anglo a bank is really stretching it...

look @Scofflaw we are either all in this together or we are not, considering that there is still no institutions and legislation in place to prevent all of this from happening again, i dont think the EU partners are serious about the future of the euro, so far all attempts amounted to kicking the can down the road and hoping some other politicians solve the problem.

hmmm

ei.sdraob wrote: »

look @Scofflaw we are either all in this together or we are not, considering that there is still no institutions and legislation in place to prevent all of this from happening again, i dont think the EU partners are serious about the future of the euro, so far all attempts amounted to kicking the can down the road and hoping some other politicians solve the problem.

On the contrary, the EU has created the powerful European Banking Authority to supervise regulators. They shouldn't need to have created this because each nation was supposed to have appointed competent regulators themselves, but because of the feckless nature of regulation in countries like Ireland the EU has decided it needs another layer of powerful regulation.

The EU's "grand bargain" amongst governments is an attempt to promote greater fiscal alignment and again stop the feckless like ourselves from behaving like children in the financial sweetshop. This will put limits on deficits, wage levels and borrowing.

I'm also amused that the same people who would be shouting down the EU amidst cries of "fascism" and "fourth Reich" if they had tried to regulate our banks are now often the same people who are blaming the EU for not getting involved. Pure hypocrisy.

ei.sdraob

@hmm you must be new here I have never cried "fascism" and "fourth Reich" when it came to EU

infact i take offence to your post considering how pro EU I have been over the course of thousands of my posts especially around the last 2 Lisbon debates we had here

the EU has let Irish people down

hmmm

ei.sdraob wrote: »

@hmm you must be new here I have never cried "fascism" and "fourth Reich" when it came to EU

infact i take offence to your post considering how pro EU I have been over the course of thousands of my posts especially around the last 2 Lisbon debates we had here

Only since 2001. I didn't accuse you of saying this, get a grip of yourself.

whatawaster

Scofflaw wrote: »

Why does Europe have a responsibility for our plight? Because we're an EU country and we were stupid enough to let our banks build up debts that dwarfed our economy - and then stupid enough to guarantee those debts entirely off our own bat?

Why do people insist on putting the blame on those who are only lending us the money to cover the debts our government freely chose to take on?

Do people simply forget what happened in September 2008? How we outsmarted everybody else with a 'heroic' guarantee of all our banks' debts? No mention of the ECB or the EU then - except the question of whether when presented with our so-clever fait accompli they would have an objection that would prevent us doing it.

cordially,
Scofflaw

But at the same time, what about the German, French, British and other banks who lent into failing institutions in Ireland. Why shouldn't the taxpayers of Europe as a whole bear the burden of this. It certainly shouldn't be Ireland alone, imo.

Our sovereign debt would be manageable if we were braver and got our deficit under control.
What is not manageable are the debts of Anglo Irish, Bank of Ireland and AIB.
Why are we more responsible for these debts than Germany or France. We were neither the borrower nor the lender.
If Europe is obsessed with keeping our banks afloat then they should fairly share the cost of this.

hmmm

whatawaster wrote: »

Our sovereign debt would be manageable if we were braver and got our deficit under control.
What is not manageable are the debts of Anglo Irish, Bank of Ireland and AIB.
Why are we more responsible for these debts than Germany or France..

I don't think many would disagree that the bondholders should take their hit, that's not the problem. The problem is that the Irish government decided when they signed the guarantee that the debts become Ireland's debts and Ireland's debts alone.

The real question isn't "why shouldn't the bondholders pay" but "how do we extricate ourselves from a promise made by an Irish government without major damage to our credibility and future prospects".

The problem with us simply rowing back on the guarantee is that we destroy trust in the Irish government credibility - if Ireland is willing to tear up a contract, why should Ireland ever be trusted again in the future? Who is going to invest in a country where the government changes the rules overnight? What happens to all those people who invested in Ireland on the back of the guarantee, who now find they have lost money?

The consequences are not simple, we have put ourselves in this mess and we are begging Europe to help us find a way out - and unfortunately most of the ways Europe can help us is by asking their taxpayers to pay. Why should German or French taxpayers be any more asked to pay for Irish bank debts than Irish taxpayers? We were the ones who elected the government which signed this guarantee, we were the ones who elected the government which put the regulator in place.

whatawaster

hmmm wrote: »

I don't think many would disagree that the bondholders should take their hit, that's not the problem. The problem is that the Irish government decided when they signed the guarantee that the debts become Ireland's debts and Ireland's debts alone.

The real question isn't "why shouldn't the bondholders pay" but "how do we extricate ourselves from a promise made by an Irish government without major damage to our credibility and future prospects".

The problem with us simply rowing back on the guarantee is that we destroy trust in the Irish government credibility - if Ireland is willing to tear up a contract, why should Ireland ever be trusted again in the future? Who is going to invest in a country where the government changes the rules overnight? What happens to all those people who invested in Ireland on the back of the guarantee, who now find they have lost money?

The consequences are not simple, we have put ourselves in this mess and we are begging Europe to help us find a way out - and unfortunately most of the ways Europe can help us is by asking their taxpayers to pay. Why should German or French taxpayers be any more asked to pay for Irish bank debts than Irish taxpayers? We were the ones who elected the government which signed this guarantee, we were the ones who elected the government which put the regulator in place.

Wasn't the guarantee to expire after two years? I know it was extended to the end of 2010, but what is it's status now?

hmmm

whatawaster wrote: »

Wasn't the guarantee to expire after two years? I know it was extended to the end of 2010, but what is it's status now?

Extended to the end of June (with some small changes). One of the problems is that you can't simply wait till July 1 and cancel it, if a new guarantee hasn't been signed by the end of June all the existing bondholders will have taken their money and run.

HellFireClub

erictheviking1 wrote: »

Love it! 2 Fingers to the EU.

Aren't we the big man aren't we?!? Telling the EU to go f*k themselves, as if we are the United States... We are a small backwater kip of an island, with 4 million people on it, 1.5 mil of those are working... We are irrelevant in terms of every decision that gets made at EU level, we are 1% of the population if not less, yet we present ourselves as if we are central to everything that goes on within the EU...

We are in for a very very rude awakening, we are deluding ourselves with our pathethic anti competitive stance on our corporate tax rate. Here's just how deluded we are at the moment, the majority of corporate entities in this state are struggling to stay open let alone make a profit. Yet we allow the small number of multinational businesses in this country who are making a profit, to not only dictate their own tax rate, but by extension, we allow them to set the tax rate for the rest of us that have to carry their tax burden.

When did we ever tell any multinational organisation before they arrived here, that we would never adjust CT rates, no more than when did we ever gave an assurance to a citizen of this state that their income tax would remain fixed??????????

Wake up lads, the country is in bits and everyone has to contribute, especially the billionaire multinational organisations that creamed it in the boom years, so lets stop codding ourselves that we have a big swinging micky around when we have the smallest c*ck in the room, let's not lose any more face with the pretence that we matter, we've been punching above our weight by basically cheating the system and now it's time to get real at the poker table because our bluffing has been sussed...

senordingdong

Permabear wrote: »

This post had been deleted.

Yeah, but that is made even more difficult when you see how all these soaring costs come from the top down.

Scofflaw

hmmm wrote: »

Wasn't the guarantee to expire after two years? I know it was extended to the end of 2010, but what is it's status now?

Extended to the end of June (with some small changes). One of the problems is that you can't simply wait till July 1 and cancel it, if a new guarantee hasn't been signed by the end of June all the existing bondholders will have taken their money and run.

This is another one that really needs to be a sticky, like 'bailout' and 'bailout'. The Guarantee (capital G) of September 2008 expired last September. It was not extended.

That Guarantee, the Credit Institutions (Financial Support) Scheme 2008 (CIFS), was a blanket guarantee on all bank debt then in the covered institutions howsoever and whenever acquired by the banks. It could only be called on during the lifetime of the guarantee. The total guaranteed under that scheme was about €400bn.

In September 2009, the government instituted a second, and separate scheme, called the "Eligible Liabilities Guarantee" (ELG). In contrast to the first scheme, this scheme only guarantees specifically named newly issued debt, but guarantees it for the lifetime of the debt. The total guaranteed under the current scheme is c. €21bn.

Existing debt was not guaranteed under the ELG, so the coverage for the pre-existing debts of the covered banks expired last September - hence the very small storm over the repayment of €750m of Anglo senior debt at the end of January. The reason for the massive jump in ECB borrowing by the Irish banks over the last few months is because the Guarantee expired - those who were still holding Irish bank bonds made sure their bonds matured at the latest just before the Guarantee expired, and that debt was repaid with money borrowed from the ECB:



The red line on the graph is the date of expiry of the original Guarantee. As you can see, things become excitingly different around that point.

cordially,
Scofflaw

rumour

Scofflaw wrote: »

That's something I'm 100% behind - but we won't get there by whipping everyone up into a frenzy of "they owe us" and "they're shafting us". They don't owe us a darn thing. They're putting their taxpayers' money on the line for us, and if they want something more in return than a load of whining, that's hardly unfair in princple.

cordially,
Scofflaw

While this is true, the current situation is our government is putting our tax payers on the line for european bank debts. They had a private debt arrangement with banks in this country, they were risky and everyone knew it. Dublin was considered the 'wild west' from wall street to frankfurt and still the money flowed in. These people wanted a return that they knew was risky but relied on Moody's and S&P and ignored the consequences. Anglo facilitated this and our government were complicit, but a government interfering in private banking contracts????

For my pennies worth, the question is with such a massive state dependency on borrowing are we prepared to let private debt be private debt or are we dependent on borrowing from the very banks or institutions we want to burn.

This is a question I think every aspect of our country considers taboo for public discourse. The answers are not palatable. It was however answered in the election. They want to continue borrowing and keep the massive state.

Scofflaw

rumour wrote: »

While this is true, the current situation is our government is putting our tax payers on the line for european bank debts.

That's a contention with rather less evidence backing it than Genesis, though. Can I ask you on what evidence you personally base that view?

rumour wrote: »

They had a private debt arrangement with banks in this country, they were risky and everyone knew it. Dublin was considered the 'wild west' from wall street to frankfurt and still the money flowed in. These people wanted a return that they knew was risky but relied on Moody's and S&P and ignored the consequences. Anglo facilitated this and our government were complicit, but a government interfering in private banking contracts????

For my pennies worth, the question is with such a massive state dependency on borrowing are we prepared to let private debt be private debt or are we dependent on borrowing from the very banks or institutions we want to burn.

This is a question I think every aspect of our country considers taboo for public discourse. The answers are not palatable. It was however answered in the election. They want to continue borrowing and keep the massive state.

Unfortunately, yes - I've certainly seen claims that the market agents that buy sovereign debt are somehow completely different from the ones that buy bank debt, but that's frankly a bizarre claim. And we do have a very large deficit - one that over the course of the banking crisis will add up to larger figures than the bank bailouts - so, yes, we're reliant on the people we want to burn, unless we prefer to remain dependent on the IMF/EU (and if they were willing for that to be the case, which they're rather obviously not).

cordially,
Scofflaw

RichardAnd

HellFireClub wrote: »

Aren't we the big man aren't we?!? Telling the EU to go f*k themselves, as if we are the United States... We are a small backwater kip of an island, with 4 million people on it, 1.5 mil of those are working...

There are 1.8 million people working in this country, not 1.5.

We are irrelevant in terms of every decision that gets made at EU level, we are 1% of the population if not less, yet we present ourselves as if we are central to everything that goes on within the EU...

We don't act as though we're central to the EU, we do our best to look after our own interests which is exactly what every other country in the EU does. The EU can't be trusted and will likely fail within the decade as, yet again, europeans prove their inability to get along with each other.

We are in for a very very rude awakening, we are deluding ourselves with our pathethic anti competitive stance on our corporate tax rate.

How is a low tax on profits anti competitive? Making it possible for companies to make more money sounds highly competitive to me.

Here's just how deluded we are at the moment, the majority of corporate entities in this state are struggling to stay open let alone make a profit.

Not true. Many firms are struggling but many, I would wager most, are making a profit. I work for an Irish company and last year we had double digit growth for the thrid year in a row and even this year, we're doing very well.

Wake up lads, the country is in bits and everyone has to contribute, especially the billionaire multinational organisations that creamed it in the boom years

Ah yes, "them rich bastards!"

so lets stop codding ourselves that we have a big swinging micky around when we have the smallest c*ck in the room, let's not lose any more face with the pretence that we matter, we've been punching above our weight by basically cheating the system and now it's time to get real at the poker table because our bluffing has been sussed...

IReland is not bluffing anyone with a low rate of CT. As you make a contracted effort to point out, we are but a tiny element of the EU so by your logic, can you tell me why our CT rate is such an unfair advantage? What's stopping the french, germans or any other european state from lowering it's CT? Nothing at all.

If we raise our CT to 25%, we will loose many of our MNCs which will put thousands of people out of work directly and many more out of work indirectly. We, as a country, have fairly unremarkable infrastructure and equally an unremarkable work force so low tax is really all we can offer. If we're so umimportant, and we are to be honest, I fail to see what real difference our tax makes. High tax is not competitive and, as a moderate capitalist and firm believer in free trade, I consider excessive taxing of profits to be wrong. We should keep our CT rate and do our best to pay our debts whilst the EU can go back to holding debates over the colour of bananas and the shape of carrots.

Tim Robbins

Too much low tax for multinationals is just creating another false economy.
It's a competitive advantage but it is one that can be easily cancelled out.

It's unsustainable economics - what Ireland are good at.

Scofflaw

Here's just how deluded we are at the moment, the majority of corporate entities in this state are struggling to stay open let alone make a profit.

Not true. Many firms are struggling but many, I would wager most, are making a profit. I work for an Irish company and last year we had double digit growth for the thrid year in a row and even this year, we're doing very well.

Actually, that probably is true. I'll need to dig for the source, but something like 61% of Irish domestic companies have paid no corporation tax in the last couple of years, because they have no profits to pay tax on.

cordially,
Scofflaw

HellFireClub

RichardAnd wrote: »

Not true. Many firms are struggling but many, I would wager most, are making a profit. I work for an Irish company and last year we had double digit growth for the thrid year in a row and even this year, we're doing very well.

Ireland is not bluffing anyone with a low rate of CT. As you make a contracted effort to point out, we are but a tiny element of the EU so by your logic, can you tell me why our CT rate is such an unfair advantage? What's stopping the french, germans or any other european state from lowering it's CT? Nothing at all.

If we raise our CT to 25%, we will loose many of our MNCs which will put thousands of people out of work directly and many more out of work indirectly. We, as a country, have fairly unremarkable infrastructure and equally an unremarkable work force so low tax is really all we can offer. If we're so umimportant, and we are to be honest, I fail to see what real difference our tax makes. High tax is not competitive and, as a moderate capitalist and firm believer in free trade, I consider excessive taxing of profits to be wrong. We should keep our CT rate and do our best to pay our debts whilst the EU can go back to holding debates over the colour of bananas and the shape of carrots.

The companies that I work with are struggling like never before to stay open, let alone turn a profit, if you were to ask them what needs to be done to allow them to stay at the races, they will tell you that they need things like local authority rates to be slashed, in the case of transport businesses, fuel costs are the biggest threat that they face at the moment, labour costs and utility costs are also way out of kilter, but any of these lads will not even mention CT to you because it clearly isn't an issue when you are losing money! Here we have the national debate and the new national leadership being completely occupied by a matter than is wholly irrelevant to many small businesses in this state at the moment, while one after the other goes out of business..

Where are these MNC's going to take flight to??? Where are they going to get a lower CT rate if we up ours by 1%??? If France has an apparently lower effective CT rate than us, then in all seriousness, what are these companies doing here to begin with?!?!?

I'm all for low tax, I fully agree with keeping the CT rate low, but we are moving onto seriously shaky territory in this country when we start allowing ANY vested interest group or set of organisations to put a gun to our head in his manner and dictate to the rest of us what the state monetary policy will be. No citizen gets any guarantees on tax in this country and neither should any business.

NO MNC was given any assurance before coming here that our CT rate would remain static, it's a rediculous thing to assume as a businessperson that taxes will remain the same, only an idiot would make a business decision on that basis.

This country is in bits because we allowed vested interest groups get their feet in under the table and call the shots, this is another example of it, we need to stand up to it and face it down.

HellFireClub

Tim Robbins wrote: »

Too much low tax for multinationals is just creating another false economy.
It's a competitive advantage but it is one that can be easily cancelled out.

It's unsustainable economics - what Ireland are good at.

Couldn't agree more, we keep thinking that we can somehow "cheat" the system by using clever taxation policy, we saw how it all ended in the property market and this is another example of us thinking we are wonderful and punching above our weight, where in reality, we have too many of our eggs in the same basket...

Scofflaw

HellFireClub wrote: »

The companies that I work with are struggling like never before to stay open, let alone turn a profit, if you were to ask them what needs to be done to allow them to stay at the races, they will tell you that they need things like local authority rates to be slashed, in the case of transport businesses, fuel costs are the biggest threat that they face at the moment, labour costs and utility costs are also way out of kilter, but any of these lads will not even mention CT to you because it clearly isn't an issue when you are losing money! Here we have the national debate and the new national leadership being completely occupied by a matter than is wholly irrelevant to many small businesses in this state at the moment, while one after the other goes out of business..

Where are these MNC's going to take flight to??? Where are they going to get a lower CT rate if we up ours by 1%??? If France has an apparently lower effective CT rate than us, then in all seriousness, what are these companies doing here to begin with?!?!?

Yes, that's an argument that's frankly becoming mind-boggling. The evil French want us to raise our CT rate above theirs so that MNCs go to France instead, even though their rate is apparently already below ours and they don't....?

We're well into "everybody knows witches are evil, because they do evil things, which they do because they're witches, which is how we know witches are evil" territory here.

HellFireClub wrote: »

I'm all for low tax, I fully agree with keeping the CT rate low, but we are moving onto seriously shaky territory in this country when we start allowing ANY vested interest group or set of organisations to put a gun to our head in his manner and dictate to the rest of us what the state monetary policy will be. No citizen gets any guarantees on tax in this country and neither should any business.

NO MNC was given any assurance before coming here that our CT rate would remain static, it's a rediculous thing to assume as a businessperson that taxes will remain the same, only an idiot would make a business decision on that basis.

This country is in bits because we allowed vested interest groups get their feet in under the table and call the shots, this is another example of it, we need to stand up to it and face it down.

I can understand the vested interests with respect to CT rate - the nice thing about US MNCs is that they're effectively on a different economic cycle to the Irish economy - but I'm really blowed if I can understand the opposition to a voluntary CCCTB. IBEC seems incredibly bothered by it, and IBEC always claims it's because the MNCs would all leave, but the MNCs don't seem bothered by it, and an optional CCCTB can't raise their taxes. And, much like CT overall, it has little or no relevance to most Irish companies. Whose vested interest is being served there?

cordially,
Scofflaw

fred252

HellFireClub wrote: »

The companies that I work with are struggling like never before to stay open, let alone turn a profit, if you were to ask them what needs to be done to allow them to stay at the races, they will tell you that they need things like local authority rates to be slashed, in the case of transport businesses, fuel costs are the biggest threat that they face at the moment, labour costs and utility costs are also way out of kilter, but any of these lads will not even mention CT to you because it clearly isn't an issue when you are losing money! Here we have the national debate and the new national leadership being completely occupied by a matter than is wholly irrelevant to many small businesses in this state at the moment, while one after the other goes out of business..

Where are these MNC's going to take flight to??? Where are they going to get a lower CT rate if we up ours by 1%??? If France has an apparently lower effective CT rate than us, then in all seriousness, what are these companies doing here to begin with?!?!?

I'm all for low tax, I fully agree with keeping the CT rate low, but we are moving onto seriously shaky territory in this country when we start allowing ANY vested interest group or set of organisations to put a gun to our head in his manner and dictate to the rest of us what the state monetary policy will be. No citizen gets any guarantees on tax in this country and neither should any business.

NO MNC was given any assurance before coming here that our CT rate would remain static, it's a rediculous thing to assume as a businessperson that taxes will remain the same, only an idiot would make a business decision on that basis.

This country is in bits because we allowed vested interest groups get their feet in under the table and call the shots, this is another example of it, we need to stand up to it and face it down.

Any of the MNC MDs that have commented on this have said this is a make or break issue for their foreign boards. Our economy is completely reliant on them. Many of the small businesses you refer to wouldn't exist were it not for the FDI in Ireland. While they might not see it as directly relevant to them at the moment - it is very much relevant to them.

HellFireClub

fred252 wrote: »

Any of the MNC MDs that have commented on this have said this is a make or break issue for their foreign boards. Our economy is completely reliant on them. Many of the small businesses you refer to wouldn't exist were it not for the FDI in Ireland. While they might not see it as directly relevant to them at the moment - it is very much relevant to them.

I just don't accept that these businesses will all up and leave if we adjust our CT rate. First of all, I don't see an issue with increasing the rate by half a percent, it's the notion that these lads in Silicon Valley over in the US have it in their heads that we won't change our tax rates over here because they are telling us that we can't, that's the bit that I find to be highly offensive as someone who is being saddled with tax in this state at the moment.

Anyone who believes that CT rates do not ever go up, I'd argue should not be allowed to run a business or sit on a board, in all seriousness, what planet are these people on?!?

At the time, I understand the need to be competitive, but there is a hell of a lot more to being competitive than championing a 12.5 CT rate, Intel themselves have said recently enough that they originally chose Ireland to locate for 12 key reasons, they have recently stated that 11 of those 12 reasons to believe in Ireland, no longer exist, they have said that they are now only here for the CT rate. Why is nobody worried about that being discussed in the Santa Clara board rooms?!? They could probably be in a country with a 15% CT rate, but much better business and labour costs, and be banking more profit after CT is deducted than they are making here, and I think we are seriously codding ourselves if we think that they are not capable of working this out for themselves.

I'd argue that on this basis, these MNC's are eventually going to up and leave anyway, and when they do, we can have the debate then about how stupid we were thinking that these guys can't count and how stupid we were thinking that something as lovely as a 12.5% tax rate could ever have been expected to keep them all here!

ei.sdraob

HellFireClub wrote: »

Where are these MNC's going to take flight to???.

There are several countries in EU with a lower corporation rate that we are already loosing companies to

HellFireClub wrote: »

I'm all for low tax, I fully agree with keeping the CT rate low, but we are moving onto seriously shaky territory in this country when we start allowing ANY vested interest group or set of organisations to put a gun to our head in his manner and dictate to the rest of us what the state monetary policy will be.

Yet it is ok for the EU to put a gun to our heads?

HellFireClub wrote: »

No citizen gets any guarantees on tax in this country and neither should any business.

Businesses need certainty and a friendly business environment, businesses create jobs, we need jobs.

HellFireClub wrote: »

NO MNC was given any assurance before coming here that our CT rate would remain static

They where, we have several Quangos whose job it is to sell Ireland as place for investment, and this has helped create hundreds of thousands of direct jobs

HellFireClub wrote: »

I just don't accept that these businesses will all up and leave if we adjust our CT rate

do you own a business?



it is not just about existing companies leaving

but about the future of external investment in Ireland, investment creates jobs, we need jobs