Apple pledges $350B to U.S. growth

SAN FRANCISCO — Apple is planning to build another corporate campus and hire 20,000 workers during the next five years as part of a $350 billion commitment to the U.S. that will be partially financed by an upcoming windfall from the nation’s new tax law.

The pledge announced yesterday comes less than a month after Congress approved a sweeping overhaul of the U.S. tax code championed by President Trump that will increase corporate profits.

Besides dramatically lowering the standard corporate tax rate, the reforms offer a one-time break on cash being held overseas.

Apple plans to take advantage of that provision to bring back most of its roughly $252 billion in offshore cash, generating a tax bill of about $38 billion. It’s something that Apple CEO Tim Cook promised the company would do if it could avoid being taxed at the 35 percent rate that had been in effect under the previous tax law.

About $75 billion of the $350 billion in U.S. investments will be paid from money that had been overseas, Apple estimated.

Companies that bring back money stashed overseas this year will be taxed at a 15.5 percent rate, below the new 21 percent rate for U.S. corporate profits under the new law.

Other U.S. companies, including American Airlines, AT&T and Comcast, have been handing out $1,000 bonuses to all their workers to share the wealth they will gain from the lower rate on their domestic earnings.

Excluding banks and other financial services companies, Moody’s Investors Service estimates corporate America has an estimated $1.6 trillion in overseas cash. Most of that is in the technology industry, with Apple sitting at the top of the heap.