Right, the graph shows a continuous increase since 2017, which tracks the growth of the worldwide pharmaceutical industry in general ($800b in 2016 [0] to $1.4t in 2024 [1].) So actually, the proportion of pharmaceutical imports that were from Ireland remained constant until a spike in late 2024.

And then there's this:

> The top seven pharmaceutical companies are paying $10 billion or so in tax on their $70 billion in offshore profit. They are just paying all that tax abroad.

So these companies already pay 14% in corporate tax. In the US, they'd pay 21% headline rate, but with room for deductions (I can't find a good source for what they actually pay, but here's [2] a bad source putting the R&D deduction alone at $15b/year across the top 8 companies). This 21% changed from 35% in the 2017 act the article criticises, though some deductions were also reduced. So corporate tax can't be the main differentiator here.

It's nice, for balance, to see an article that says the problem with Trump is that he just isn't protectionist enough. But the arguments here don't hold up.

[0] https://www.efpia.eu/media/219735/efpia-pharmafigures2017_st...

[1] https://efpia.eu/media/2rxdkn43/the-pharmaceutical-industry-...

[2] https://americansfortaxfairness.org/drug-firms-fight-restore...