larger companies responded by offshoring R&D to countries with more favorable tax regimes, leading to U.S. job losses. For example, Google reportedly shifted some work to Germany, and Microsoft moved a bunch of research work to China - both because pay rates were better and because the local subsidiary company in that jurisdiction operated under the national laws for that nation, which … were not the US tax laws. They were much more like the previous US tax laws, because the rest of the world had realized “hey, we also want to encourage people to invest in R&D and grow the next trillion dollar company here!” And this new tax ruling doesn’t precisely say “we don’t want to do that” but it does say “we don’t want you to be quick about it” - which everyone who believes in the Amazing Growth Story thinks is anathema to their strategy.

Anyway, the impact of this tax strategy turned out to be: layoffs of U.S.-based engineers while companies restructured operations abroad.