Coumo tax plan music to Irish ears

Andrew Cuomo’s proposed tax-free zones centred around New York’s public universities is music to the ears of the Irish authorities. The New York governor’s “By tax-free, I mean really, really tax-free,” comments put the current furore over Apple and other US companies use of Irish non-resident companies in a different light.

For one thing it does away with any lingering doubt that there is some sort of fundamental moral debate under way in US about big companies paying taxes. Whilst some may see things through this prism, for others it is really a matter of economic pragmatism. In Mr Cuomo's case it is about staunching the flow of jobs and business from New York, which is seen to be a high tax location, to more competitive states such as Texas and Florida.

"If you just reduced the loss of jobs, that would be a home run. We create start-up businesses. Right now we just can't keep them," Mr Cuomo told the Financial Times this week. The debate in New York seems to be about whether it will work, rather than whether it should be done at all. The plan will "help end the brain drain that's plagued our communities for years", says Brian Sampson, executive director of Unshackle Upstate, a business advocacy group. Whilst EJ McMahon of the Empire Center for New York State Policy, a conservative think tank, reportedly said in a recent blog post that "the initiative is highly unlikely to generate growth on a game-changing scale" and instead called for zero corporation tax in up-state New York.

Not too much moralising there and plenty of support for the argument that Ireland can't be faulted for doing everything in its power to attract US companies here.