Ireland forced to take EU bailout - Warning - Video contains violence against Leprechauns

Video - Taiwanese animators cover the Irish bailout

Source - Huff Po

Ireland, once heralded as a model of growth, has quickly become a debt-addled nation that, at least one prominent Irish leader, says was cajoled into accepting a massive bailout and harsh budget cuts.  Along the way, the video notes, Ireland was embroiled in a speculative housing bubble and became something of a tax haven, home to accounting gimmicks like the "Double Irish."

The result, according to the video, was that the economy once called the "Celtic tiger" turned into a house cat, and civil unrest has been unleashed after cuts to social services.

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Google 2.4% Rate Shows How $60 Billion Lost to Tax Loopholes

Google Inc. cut its taxes by $3.1 billion in the last three years using a technique that moves most of its foreign profits through Ireland and the Netherlands to Bermuda.

Google’s income shifting -- involving strategies known to lawyers as the “Double Irish” and the “Dutch Sandwich” -- helped reduce its overseas tax rate to 2.4 percent, the lowest of the top five U.S. technology companies by market capitalization, according to regulatory filings in six countries.

“It’s remarkable that Google’s effective rate is that low,” said Martin A. Sullivan, a tax economist who formerly worked for the U.S. Treasury Department. “We know this company operates throughout the world mostly in high-tax countries where the average corporate rate is well over 20 percent.”

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-10-21/google-2-4-rate-shows-how-60-billion-u-s-revenue-lost-to-tax-loopholes.html

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Prez: Iceland Better Off Than Ireland Because They Let Big Private Banks Fail

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-11-26/iceland-faring-much-better-after-permitting-banks-to-fail-grimsson-says.html

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"Tell the EU and IMF to Shove It!"

http://www.counterpunch.org/whitney11252010.html

Comments

[DailyBail]

Google 2.4% Rate Shows How $60 Billion Lost to Tax Loopholes

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-10-21/google-2-4-rate-shows-how-60-billion-u-s-revenue-lost-to-tax-loopholes.html

[DailyBail]

Irish Minister: ECB 'Bounced' Ireland Into Bailout

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704679204575646313382067180.html?mod=googlenews_wsj

[DailyBail]

http://www.nma.tv/wp-content/uploads/2010/11/ireland.jpg

pitchfork..you'll want to see this photo

[DailyBail]

Iceland Better Off Than Ireland Because They Let Big Private Banks Fail, says President

http://www.activistpost.com/2010/11/iceland-better-off-than-ireland-because.html

[DailyBail]

Caution from Bernanke sends stock indexes lower

http://finance.yahoo.com/news/Caution-from-Bernanke-sends-apf-1668405800.html?x=0&sec=topStories&pos=5&asset=&ccode=