Google has agreed to pay € 965 million to the French government to settle a tax dispute that began four years ago. The French authorities had asked Google about 1.6 billion euros in unpaid taxes, arguing that although the company's European headquarters are located in Ireland – where taxes are much lower than in the rest of the continent – many of the activities are concentrated on the French territory.
Maintaining the headquarters in Ireland is a ploy used by most American technology companies to pay as little tax as possible in other European countries, where they still employ tens of thousands of workers and where many of their work activities are physically concentrated. Reuters writes that the agreement “could create a legal precedent for other technology companies in the country”.
