Please don't put words in my mouth. Tax competition that doesn't bring any significant benefits to your economy is not a good thing, because you're giving away something for nothing. I included this qualifier in my original post. Why have the government not arrranged it to the country's advantage? Because a) the government that put these rules in place was not that competent, b) it overestimated the amount of job creation that would result from offering such schemes and c) since Ireland is a small country with a relatively small economy it doesn't have that much negotiating clout. If they pulled the plug on the arrangement tomorrow many f those multinationals would just move their headquarters to Luxembourg or Lichtenstein or whoever else was willing to to offer them a favorable tax regime.

As for the Telegraph article, it doesn't really bear out your point, but rather echoes mine: "Microsoft, Google, Facebook, Twitter, and a host of household names have regional headquarters in Dublin, whether drawn by a corporation tax of 12.5pc or by the critical mass of a high-tech skills. How much value is added to the Irish economy is an open question." Those regional headquarters do not involve huge numbers of jobs, any more than the large number of US companies registered in Delaware make that state a hotbed of industrial and commercial activity.

If you're the shareholder of a big company that can leverage tax competition, then tax competition is a good thing. If you're anybody else - starting from businesses that have to cope with normal tax rates where they operate, and compete with the aforementioned big companies - it is a bad thing.