1. ETRs are firms’ income tax expense divided by their pre-tax incomes for the year.

2. Effective rates are the median rates for all publicly-traded companies incorporated (and publicly traded) within that country
[eg. Google aren’t publically traded on the ISEQ]

3. While many countries’ ETRs are below the statutory rates, a few have ETRs higher than the statutory rates. This is because the statutory rate only includes the national income tax rate. In contrast, firms’ reported ETRs include national, local and foreign taxes paid. For example, Cayman Island companies have median ETRs of under 10 percent, but this is comprised solely of taxes paid to other countries.
I think this table just shows how Irish corporations such as smurfit and roadstone have not benefitted as much from the corporation tax as multinationals.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Double_Irish_Arrangement
There’s a pdf at the bottom of the wiki article with exact details.
There’s a HUGE scope for trickery under the above arrangement, common knowledge abroad since 2007.

They calculate the effective tax rate for all publicly traded firms in the world. They then provide a breakdown by country of incorporation. It seems to me that the data they are using is for all companies listed as PLCs in Ireland. I might be wrong on this and I am open to correction, but that interpretation gels with what they say in the article provided. I don’t think anyone has access to Compustat, so we cannot clear up this issue by looking at the primary data.

If the data is based on firms that are listed as PLCs in Ireland, then this would most likely exclude the vast majority of foreign firms, who generally establish private limited companies in Ireland. This would necessarily exclude subsidiaries of Google, Amazon, Dell etc. from the data, since they are not publicly traded companies incorporated in Ireland; instead, they are private limited companies that are subsidiaries of publicly traded companies incorporated in the US and other jurisdictions. This would undoubtedly have an effect on the stats.

You said that I am wrong. The evidence you have used to show that I am wrong points to Ireland having an effective corporation tax rate of 15.5%

I’m just saying well done, because it is the first time I have heard this, and it goes against what Bloomberg and the New York Times have been reporting for the past year.

But can you clear this up for me? The €5 billion in corporation tax. How much in taxable profits is that based upon?

This is ground-breaking stuff here Peggy. Well done. It puts Bloomberg and the New York Times to shame, that’s for sure.

How much in taxable profits is the €5 billion in corporation tax based upon?

I’m particularly interested in the 61 companies you have found that pay an average of 15.5% corporation tax.

Who are these companies that pay more corporation tax in Ireland than they are legally bound to pay?

And my figure of approx. 3 billion is for IDA-supported companies.