Dr. Dre shelters income in Ireland

Andre Young (Dr. Dre) is setting up three legal entities in Ireland to shelter income from the European sales of his beats head phones.  The fake corporations were set-up by and accounting firm in Cork, Ireland.  According to the article. Beats headphones has no other presence in Ireland.

The Irish Herald has the story here. 

The story in the Irish Independent is here.

Brown University Economic Impact Statement

Here is a report from Brown University detailing it's economic impact on the Rhode Island and Providence communities.  The report is here for 2012.

Year 2012
Year 2009
Year 2005

We go back and forth on these reports.  They are clearly done for public relations reasons.  Brown Univeristy must be feeling some heat to produce these reports.

On the other had we believe in making public investment decisions based on hard facts like cost benefit analysis.  These rudimentary economic impact reports are a good first step when state and local goverments have to make decisions about infrastructure and services.

Don't try do this at home kids: UK Austerity Update from NYT

The New York Times has a long look at UK austerity program under David Cameron's Conservative government. The New York Times article is here.  Cameron recently announced the austerity would continue for another five years.

The UK Independent has a piece on the UK budget deficit worsening.  The article from the UK Independent is here.

Here is a discussion in the London Review of Books calling the Cameron / Osborne policy a failure.  The story by John Lanchester.  He has a great reference in it to the International Monetary Fund's World Economic Outlook (October 2012) publication. On Page 41, of IMF Outlook,  they discuss the multiplier used calculating the effect of government spending cuts on the larger economy.  The IMF suggests that the GDP reduction effect could be as high as 1.7 times the cut.  In other word, removing 100 Billion pounds in spending would reduce economic activity by 170 Billion pounds.  Not something you want to be doing during a recession.

So you have to ask if the savings are worth crippling the economy.

In our opinion, voters want simple solutions to complicated problems and politicians are willing to do just that.

Thank goodness the US federal reserve has the right idea: Low, predictable interest rates for the short and medium term, short term stimulus until unemployment falls to a certain level and pressure on policy makers for gradually reduce long-term healthcare costs.

UK Guardian: Starbucks, Google and Amazon in the press for paying no UK taxes

The press in the UK has seized the issue of the large corporation paying little or no taxes in the United Kingdom.

Here is a story about Members of Parliament requesting action on tax avoidance.  In the UK Guardian. According to the story Starbucks paid no UK taxes in the past three years and paid only 8.6 million pound in UK taxes on sales of 3.1 Billion.  A rate of 0.28% or about a quarter of 1%.

Which tax havens do the top 100 US companies use

Every wonder which countries the Fortune 100 use for the tax shelters ?  Well the government already knows.  Here is a report from the GAO that lists which countries helped the Fortune 100 avoid taxes. It also lists the countries used by the top 100 government contractors.

The report from the GAO in 2009 is here. GOA Tax Shelter Report.  It list which countries are used by which companies to avoid paying US taxes.

The financial industry was the leader in the number of tax shelter companies followed by the pharmaceutical and high-tech industries.  Both industries transfer their patents or other assets to low tax jurisdictions and then collect royalties.  They also earn profits outside the US and then use the money for overseas investments.

NY Times: Poverty in Japan

New York Times to the rescue always. I was looking for something on poverty in Japan.  I was trying to find a developed post-industrial country comparable to the US which may have followed an economic route similar to us and has a aging population.  It does not look good for the US. 

Poverty in Japan.

Is their a "Real" Skills Gap in Manufacturing ?

I came across this publication from the Manufacturing Institute describing a skills gap in manufacturing in the united states.  Skills Gap in Manufacturing.

I have a lot of problems with the report.  1) It seems totally self-serving.  The manufacturing industry wants better skilled employees, but does not want to pay any more money in wages or benefits. 2) They want federal, state and local governments to pay for closing the gap.3) Proposes the manufacturing industry do little or nothing different to close the gap.

We realize manufacturers are in a very tight bind between off shore price pressure and low domestic demand. However, we would propose more internal cross-training and job flexibility along with employee ownership, not just outsourcing the problem to the government.