The Irish Economy

What is US foreign direct investment in Ireland up to? A lot of different things. Some firms are here to produce and ship to the EU, others are here for research purposes, and yes, some are here primarily for tax purposes. This latter group is the one that will be most sensitive to changes in tax policy, both in the US and elsewhere as they plan where to have their income accrue for tax purposes. In a previous post, I argued that the Obama administration’s recent proposals would not have a substantial impact on employment in Ireland. Some have taken this to mean that I am suggesting that there will be little impact on the value of FDI here. Not so. The combination of low Irish tax rates and US tax policy give firms a reason to declare their foreign earned income in Ireland and to reinvest those earnings in order to avoid costly repatriation taxes. Do firms take advantage of this? Anecdotal evidence surely indicates that they do. Data from the US Bureau of Economic Analysis gives us a better insight into how this combination makes Ireland a bit unusual. Using 2006 data (the most recent for which data were available on the website), I was able to construct the following table that gives the top eleven countries by the sales/employee, FDI position/employee, and assets/employee (all numbers are in 1000s of US dollars).