Living on our tax dollars but fleeing them-- tax inverters AbbVie and Medtronic

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http://www.opednews.com/articles/Living-on-our-tax-dollars-by-Martha-Rosenberg-Adhd_Corporations-Health-Care_Debt-GOP-Tax-Cuts_Drugs-140823-942.html



Living on our tax dollars but fleeing them-- tax inverters AbbVie and Medtronic
By Martha Rosenberg
General News 8/23/2014 at 13:39:35

It's called "inversion" -- US corporations reincorporating in countries like Britain, Ireland or the Netherlands to duck US taxes, often by merging with a European entity.

The latest corporation to try to please investors with this tax dodge was Illinois-based Walgreen, the US's largest pharmacy chain. But this month, under accusations from customers and lawmakers that the maneuver was unpatriotic, unfair to corporations remaining in the US and hypocritical because most of its profits come from American households, Walgreen backed down.

The Illinois-based drug company AbbVie, on the other hand, is proceeding with its announced merger with the British drug company Shire, based on the small island of Jersey in the English Channel. The company "is expected to be resident in the UK for tax purposes," according to AbbVie's SEC filing. If the deal goes ahead, the company will have a bigger market value than Boeing, McDonald's and Cisco, writes The New York Times, totaling more than $137 billion.

AbbVie was spun off from North Chicago-based Abbott Laboratories in 2012 largely on the basis of Humira, a medication that treats autoimmune conditions like rheumatoid arthritis that's become the best-selling drug in the world.