Dublin accounted for more than half the income tax and VAT receipts collected by Government last year while more than half of the State’s record corporate tax take emanated from Cork.
The Parliamentary Budget Office (PBO) has published a new “interactive dashboard” that provides a more detailed breakdown – by economic sector and county – of the Irish tax base.
It shows that €16.2 billion of PAYE income tax in 2024, out of total of €29.6 billion, was paid by workers in Dublin.
Consumers in the capital were also responsible for the lion’s share of VAT receipts, paying €11.7 billion out of the €20.5 billion total collected from the sales tax.
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Cork, however, was responsible for €21.4 billion of the State’s record €39 billion corporate tax haul last year.
The €39 billion included €11 billion of the Apple tax money, covering most of the money owed as a result of a high-profile European court ruling last September, plus Apple’s annual corporate tax liability for 2024.
The iPhone maker Cork’s campus serves as its European headquarters and employs over 6,000 people. The company is the biggest payer of corporate tax in the Republic.
Dublin was responsible for €14.1 billion of corporate tax in 2024, meaning Dublin and Cork combined made up €35.5 of the €39 billion total in business tax receipts collected last year.
The next biggest county was Galway with €405 million.
On a sector-by-sector basis, the PBO’s dashboard shows the wholesale and retail trade sector accounted for the biggest lump of corporate tax receipts at €16.2 billion followed by manufacturing (€9.5 billion); information and communication (€6.2 billion); and financial and insurance activities (€4 billion).
While much has been made of the State’s lopsided corporate tax base, with just 10 firms providing more than half the receipts, the PBO’s data show the same multinational-dominated sectors (wholesale and retail, manufacturing, information and communication and financial and insurance activities) accounted for €13.5 billion of the €29.6 billion paid in PAYE income tax last year.
The purpose of the dashboard “is to present net tax receipts data published by Revenue Commissioners in a visual and interactive manner,” the PBO said.
“In doing so, it aims to enhance members’ and committees’ understanding of tax revenues which are used to fund public services,” it said.
A previous report by the PBO, which acts as the parliament’s budgetary oversight body, showed the top 8 per cent of earners in Ireland account for more than 54 per cent of the income tax paid to the State.
