One Country's Robin Hood Is Another's Scourge
Man Making Ireland Tax Avoidance Hub Proves Local Hero
Bloomberg
If I were a slave to narrative, I would begin the tale like this: One man sits on a folding chair in a garage outside Washington D.C., scrupulously tackling the problems in the corporate tax code without partisan leanings. Another splits his time between an apartment in the south of France and a million-dollar house in a Dublin suburb, being celebrated by his countrymen while helping clients like Google avoid taxes. These are the stories of Marty Sullivan, profiled in The Washington Post, and Feargal O’Rourke, featured in Bloomberg, and while it’s tempting to see one as a hero and the other as a villain, the title of the Bloomberg piece is an indication of just how complicated the debate over corporate tax reform really is. O’Rourke, as the tax head at PwC in Ireland and an adviser to politicians, has carved out a nice little niche that both helps multinationals save money and supports his home country. He talks with pride about “selling Ireland” to companies and asks, “Why should Ireland be the policeman for the U.S.?”