Gizmodo: Google’s Shady Tax Evasion Practices Screw the Government (and You) Out of $3.1 Billion

Google’s startlingly low rate–how much do you pay every year?–goes back to a deal brokered with the IRS itself. The feds let Google license its search and ad tech to a subsidiary in Ireland–Google Ireland Holdings–which begins a long, international cash siphon that ends in Bermuda. Licensing tech from Google racks up expenses, which allow Google’s dummy company to duck Irish tax law. The money generated in Ireland is shuttled to the Netherlands, which, because of EU law, further keeps government hands out of Google’s earnings. From here, revenue is paid to another subsidiary in Bermuda, where it becomes virtually invisible–under Irish law, this tropical tail end of this money snake isn’t required to disclose any financial documents.

How awesomely not evil.