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100% agree with the article. When an iPhone is sold in Germany, there is a VAT on that product that definitely goes to the government, right?

So the main question is the corporate tax and not the per unit? Perhaps it would make sense to capture the true tax for in-country sales by adjusting the per unit tax?

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It's the customers who pay the VAT, not Apple. That's why electronics bought in US where the sales taxes are generally much lower than VAT rates seem cheaper from the European perspective. A higher VAT also hits more the less privileged and effectively crowds them out of the market. For goods like these you can think of the VAT is 'the price to be able to buy' and corporate tax as 'the price to be able to sell'.

No corporation pays taxes, in reality it’s either customers or shareholders who pay them. The point being Apple still generates maeve taxes for Germany and shouldn’t pay it squat in income tax.

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