The Donald keeps on winning

Originally posted by pints ↑

Apple’s announcement on Wednesday that it will repatriate most of the estimated $274 billion that it holds in offshore earnings is great news for the United States. Uncle Sam will get a one-time $38 billion tax payment. The company promises to add 20,000 jobs to its U.S. work force, a 24 percent increase, and build a new campus. Another $5 billion will go toward a fund for advanced manufacturing in America.
C’mon. What’s with the long face?
In December this column warned that hysterical opposition to the Republican tax bill was a fool’s game for Democrats that could only help Donald Trump. Yes, there were things to dislike in the legislation, from both a liberal and a conservative perspective.
But it was not the moral and fiscal apocalypse its critics claimed. And its central achievement — a dramatic cut in corporate rates to 21 percent from 35 percent — was an economic no-brainer that many Democrats, including President Obama, had supported (albeit less steeply) just a few years ago.
Apple will not be the only multinational that will soon bring back gigantic profits to take advantage of new low repatriation rates. Microsoft holds $146 billion in overseas earnings, Pfizer $178 billion, General Electric $82 billion, Alphabet $78 billion, and Cisco $71 billion, according to estimates from the Zion Research Group. The total stash is about $3 trillion — by one measure nearly three times what it was just a decade ago.
Assume that just half of that money comes home to the United States. It’s still the equivalent of Canada’s entire gross domestic product. Not too shabby, especially considering all the hyperbolic predictions of economic doom that went with Trump’s election.

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watso had been thinking about mentioning something about apple sending money back to the usa. so apple will pay $38bn in taxes, but it was also mentioned somewhere, that the tax cuts saved apple over $50bn - but the money was staying offshore.

watso has no idea how the usa tax system works - but maybe apple will pay bigger dividends to shareholders (the majority probably being American shareholders) - and dividends = increased consumer spending = flow on effects through the economy=increased tax take for the government .

ok - time will sort everything out - but in 50 years time, when there is the benefit of hindsight - then a good contrast could be made by comparing the outcomes of the leftist Chavez government in Venezuela, against the right wing policies of trump in America (assuming that the trump policies are not overturned in the meantime) .

one thing for sure, is that the left wing policies of Chavez have totally failed - we did not have to wait 50 years to find out.

and just to recall, but a whole pile of leftie idiots wanted to invite Chavez to Australia to show Australia how socialism worked