Perhaps no other sector shrouds itself in nonsense hyperbole as much as the tech sector. It supersedes even self-help, marketing, politics and PR. Founders and chief executives oftentimes speak as if they are assuming the guises of deities.
And, in many ways, they are: all-powerful, rich beyond anyone’s wildest dreams, capable of influencing vast changes in lifestyle behaviours of massive populations, with endless followers who term products they invent such as the “Jesus Phone” (the first iPhone). They stand on altars and preach their message, lending gravity to social medial platforms and software and hardware as if it is philosophy or humanity or thought itself.
In short, they are clever people. But even clever people can be full of crap.
This meaningless hyperbole was in full effect when Tim Cook spoke to Morning Ireland last week. "It's maddening, it's disappointing, it's clear that this comes from a political place. It has no basis in fact or in law," the Apple chief executive said of the European Commission's finding that Apple pay as little tax as possible and route profits through Ireland to do so.
“And, unfortunately,” Cook continued, “it’s one of those things we have to work through. I’m sure your listeners can relate to this. When you’re accused of doing something that is so foreign to your values, it brings out an outrage in you. And that’s how we feel. Apple has always been about doing the right thing, never the easy thing.”
We can relate
It is kind of hard to take someone like Tim Cook seriously when he says “I’m sure you listeners can relate to this . . . ” Yeah, Tim, I can totally relate to getting stung for a tax bill of €13 billion.
“Together Ireland and Apple are thriving,” Cook said, pushing the narrative of the poor multibillion-dollar hero being wronged alongside its goofy little sidekick, the Emerald Isle.
“It’s a 37-year-old marriage. Like any marriage, you go through a pothole here and there.” Hands up who’s ever encountered a €13 billion-sized pothole. “But we’ve stuck together, because we’ve always felt so close to the community there and the people there . . . every time I go it’s getting a shot of joy being there.”
We're with you, Tim! We're with you every step of the way! Oh, say can you see, by the dawn's early light . . . Sorry, there's something in my eye.
“I do have faith that the right outcome will occur,” he concluded. So do I, Tim. So do I.
The fluffiness of tech company language is not an accident. It is a strategy. Corporations positioning themselves as touchy-feely change-makers are disarming, but it’s also tosh. If you want to talk about values, then let’s talk about ethics.
It is unethical that multibillion-dollar corporations pay so little tax. It is unethical that tax systems are constructed and facilitated to allow this to happen. It is unethical that countries design their tax regimes to facilitate corporations not paying their fair share. It is unethical for a government to ask its little people to cough up substantial amounts of tax and then turn around and let incredibly rich people pay so little.
Just because this is often done legally doesn’t make it right. The system is rigged.
Conversations in the aftermath of the Apple tax ruling seemed to mostly revolve around the ways in which Ireland could get its grubby little hands into the till in order to somehow benefit. That is pathetic. If the argument is an ethical one, then there are actual rights and wrongs. But we pretend there's a grey area, a chasm where we can smugly rest and talk about the benefits of wrongdoing, and how we can reap rewards from shady practices.
We should be ashamed that our Government is trying to manoeuvre itself in any way other than calling out how grossly unfair it is that the rich pay little and the poor (because pretty much everyone next to Apple looks poor) pay a lot.
What the Government wants is for Ireland to continue to be known as the wide boys of international corporations, a global financial backstreet where anything goes. The politicians get to crow about jobs, and the multibillion-dollar corporations get to siphon off their profits by paying hardly any tax.
Marriage
When Cook talks about this marriage to Ireland, does anyone really believe that multibillion-dollar corporations, whose goal is profit, honestly care about Ireland? Why would they have concerns about what kind of society we’d like to build, or what our aspirations for a republic are? Does anyone honestly think that if another country came along with opportunities to suit their profit-making goals, that they wouldn’t shift operations over there?
Sure, some companies have invested quite a bit in Ireland, including Apple in Cork and Google in Dublin, but the money they've put in is loose change compared to the money they are making.
Unfortunately we are now left depending on Irish politicians to make a moral choice, which is never a good position to be in. Unless they do, we will continue to sell out, and we will have to admit to ourselves that morality and global economics are incompatible. And so are morality and Irish politics.