Net Results: One of the more impolitic remarks I have ever heard come from the Taoiseach - at least in the context of Irish-American relations - was his extraordinary observation that this nation would do best from the Bush victory because of the proposal by John Kerry to tax profits earned abroad by US companies in order to combat the outsourcing of US jobs.
How much more self-focused in response to a foreign election could he be? That famous, perhaps apocryphal British newspaper headline comes to mind: "Fog in Channel, continent cut off."
Ireland, sir, is not the sun around which US business investment revolves. At the very least, the comment was better suited to economists or business pundits, not the head of a nation that historically has had very close links to Mr Kerry's Democratic party, especially after a highly divisive election.
Mr Ahern's remarks also seem ill-informed given that within days, similar proposals were being touted as part of the programme of tax reform that Mr Bush plans to embark on during his second term. So much for the special relationship - but that had already been shown the door when President Clinton exited the White House.
I wonder if the Taoiseach will lobby Mr Bush about his proposed tax - should it materialise - in the way he vowed he would have done if Kerry had won.
If so, he would demonstrate even poorer judgment than that already shown. First off, consider the Kerry taxation plan, intended to keep more jobs in the US, where the trend towards outsourcing is a growing concern for American workers. Would the tax have had a significant impact on the Republic?
Not likely. It's not as if multinationals would suddenly close their foreign operations and pull all offices back into the US. Irish operations of the multinationals tend to be focused on the European, Middle East and Africa markets, where a set-up in Europe is an advantage.
In addition, as one US-based Irish business observer told me this week, the numbers add up here for foreign companies, with or without that extra tax. Successive governments have created a nice little base for foreign multinationals to protect income and it is that - not the "well-educated workforce" or other IDA-brochure reasons the multinationals will cite - that really makes the Republic attractive to inward investment.
And the tax "amnesty" signed into law by Mr Bush ahead of the election is - contrary to what some might think - just another part of how the game works.
The amnesty is simply part of a longish cycle where money (lots of it - indeed, mind-boggling amounts) is held in tax-friendly countries such as the Republic.
Actually, according to those who know how money works, the cash isn't actually held here except on paper, and doesn't really benefit this country - not even Irish banks. The reality is the multinationals employ bean-counters to figure out how to do the legal shuffles that put the money to work elsewhere, which means it isn't sitting earning money in Irish accounts at all.
That said, on paper a large US multinational might have billions - yes, billions - based here, due to the light Irish tax regime of 12.5 per cent corporate tax plus other friendly incentives.
The companies will sort out their affairs in such a way that as much income as possible comes into the State so that they can avail of that low tax rate. Hence, we are the largest software exporter in the world - not because we develop much of it here, but because it pays to manufacture, shrinkwrap and ship the final product from the Republic, as the global income comes in this front door.
US companies can then hold that money here, or put it to work elsewhere for as long as they want, provided it isn't repatriated to the US. At that point, the company must pay the difference between the 12.5 per cent levied here and its US tax obligations .
Which is where the tax amnesty comes in. Historically, every couple of decades a US administration will offer this type of amnesty, where all that offshore money can be repatriated to the US if desired, at a lower tax rate than usual. Under the amnesty this figure is 5.25 per cent, a reduction of 85 per cent.
To the public, this looks good - a president cleaning up multinational business practices and getting all those billions back into the US economy.
But, in reality, it's just a way to let the companies bring their cash pile back to the US at a lower cost than they'd normally be hit for.
Sources say there was huge pressure on Mr Bush to bring in such an amnesty now, when exchange rates mean income held in euros has a big 30 per cent buffer that will easily cover the tax due and have plenty left over.
Companies will hurry to bring that money home in the 12-month amnesty, then the process will begin all over again. The amnesties aren't guaranteed but they generally come around if a company can afford to wait out the intervening years.
So expect a torrent of paper funds to exit the Republic over the coming year. However, because none of those billions were sitting around benefiting our economy to begin with, we won't miss them much when they fly home to the US. This amnesty, therefore, won't have any great impact on the Irish economy - which everyone in the know knows.
Maybe the Taoiseach should lobby over here to find a way to keep some of that real cash within the Irish financial system, where it could generate profits that would help the national tax base.
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