Mr Kamprad, 87, said he would leave Switzerland before the end of the year and settle down on a farm outside of Almhult, a southern Swedish town where he founded Ikea 70 years ago and put Swedish \”flat-pack\” furniture on the global map.
Interestingly, Swedish inequality will rise as he does so. I assume that the Spirit Level crowd will be able to identify the consequenty breakdown of society?
Tim, don’t be silly, people don’t move around because of taxes. Ritchie says so therefore it must be true. I am sure this is just to enjoy the far nicer climate in sweden instead of switzerland
How comes Ikea haven’t appeared on the ignorant tax campaigners’ radar yet? They’re not Swedish; they’re Dutch, for tax reasons.
Squander, actually they are owned through two liechtenstein foundations and managed from Swizerland. This is in the public domain:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interogo_Foundation.
Really? It was The Netherlands last time I checked. Funny old world.
Oh, I see. No, Interogo owns the intellectual property. Ikea itself is Dutch.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IKEA#Corporate_structure
Course, the reason we’re even disagreeing about this is that Ikea’s corporate structure is very complicated, which helps them to reduce their tax bill. I have no objection to that, but I note that the touchy feely posters they put up in their stores appear to fool the people who do. And I do get slightly annoyed by the never-ending “Oh we’re so terribly Swedish, the most Swedish thing ever in the history of Sweden” publicity, when they’re not.
Squander Two, Oh no, I agree with you entirely, Ikea is the very face of evil as far as I am concerned. nothing to do with thier tax affairs. More power to em I say. just that thier furniture is shit really and I too get pissed off with the “swedish thing as well”. The last time I checked sweden was a bit more than flat pack furniture made out of crappy chipboard called SVENBLADE or some other such crap.
I agree with you no disagreementing intended at all.
Offshore, you won’t like this story about IKEA then.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2349480/IKEA-develops-flat-pack-REFUGEE-CAMPS-designed-replace-tented-cities-disaster-zones.html
I am not sure what use Kamprad moving back to Sweden is going to do. He is not much longer for this world I suspect and he was never a big spender to begin with.
All that money is not going to help the Swedish economy unless he develops a sudden liking for expensive champagne, cheap hookers and cocaine. Come on, you old Nazi, you can do it! Your country needs you.