Why does Apple avoid paying taxes? Because it can.

I caught this over at Pew:

A U.S. Senate report released last month said foreign tax havens cost the U.S. $150 billion a year in lost revenue. It didn’t address state tax losses. Apple, for example, has paid no federal or state income taxes on tens of billions of dollars in overseas income over the past four years. Apple CEO Tim Cook told Congress last year his company is complying with all tax laws, state and federal. He called for “vast simplification” of the U.S. tax code.

“We know it’s legal and that’s the problem,” said Dan Smith, a tax and budget expert at U.S. PIRG, a consumer advocacy group. “The average person who is paying their taxes and seeing how we’ve cut a lot from budgets and priorities that people care about says, ‘If I have to pay my taxes, why can Apple abuse the rules and not pay any taxes?’”

There, in a nutshell, is the problem. Apple, and its corporate counterparts, use the loopholes in the tax code to dodge taxes — loopholes greased by generous campaign contributions, or, as we like to call it, legalized bribery. And the people wonder why they aren’t able to do the same.