IRA and mcdonalds...

[joko]

in the 80s theres was an outcry because people believed that mcdonalds were donating a portion of their employees wages to the IRA - as somewhere on their payslips it said IRA and then an amount of money

some people went mad about this...then it was denounced as nonsense and that IRA actually stood for something else, such as Inland Revenue something...or Income...etc (not sure what it was exactly)

but still people fed the rumour, by passing it round...even when theyd heard the other explanation, they wanted to spread it....

i have heard a few people recently actually still believe this and still boycott mcdonalds because of it...they also now claim the so-called 'true explanation' was just a cover up...

so id like to know - was there any truth in this? even remotely?

i find it very hard to believe that a large company like mcdonalds would donate to the IRA, openly or secretly, and furthermore, that they would be so stupid as to print it on their payslips...

thanks

[sandyRoe]

I think the McDonalds you might see on the High St are franchises. A local businessman pays to use the name and profits from it.
To suggest that they would have supported the IRA is crazy.

[cc1]

In the USA, IRA is a taxation system, don't know how it works, but I think it referred to tax, not the terrorists organisation!

[237SJ]

Mud sticks. Once a rumour starts, it`s hard to squash. There`s a rumour in the airline world that Monarch Airlines are owned by a Mafia connected family. It`s NOT true of course (don`t want the heavies on my doorstep)!

[cc1]

Just googled IRA and it's a retirement fund in the US.

[zita-green]

IRS - Internal Revenue Service - income tax in the USA. Sandyroe is right; Macs are franchises.

[snags]

IRA = Individual Retirement Account... some sort of pension plan in the US.

[stewey]

Snags is right; it's a retirement plan in the States.

[starone]

Franchises!! Amazing!!! How do they get everything to taste the same in every McDonalds?

[joggerjayne]

Because all the franchise owners have to buy from central suppliers.

[ABerrant]

Us MacDonalds had NORAID collection boxes on the counter.

The IRA "mix-up" is an urban myth.

[sandyRoe]

Individual owners of McD restaurants in the USA could have put whatever collection box they wanted on the counter. Doesn't mean the McD corporation supported Noraid.

[Answerprancer]

Good for you R ...you can probably guess I boycott it for other reasons as well as your one ;-)

[eyethenkyew]

What an old wives' tale!

[stewey]

I'm always amazed at the number people who put down "McDonalds", and yet it's one of the largest earning companies in the world: they must be doing something that's popular.

[VHG]

What is stupid about this "rumour" is that even if McDonalds WERE giving money to the IRA (which they weren't) they are hardly going to include the fact on everybody's pay slip.

Some people are so gullible.

[woofgang]

at work we wanted folk to use their staff number (called a personnel number) as their computer log in because it was already in the system, most people knew theirs off by heart as you needed to put it on the mileage claim every month. Some fool started the idea that it was a PERSONAL number and if other people go to know what it was they could access your details on the salary system and change what you got paid.
Now the number wasn't confidential, and at that time (year ago) monthly salary paid was calculated by people and only the total number was put on computer, you couldn't change it. Could we get folk to accept that? nope! It seems that by and large we have a space in our heads labelled "reserved for stupid theory" and any old carp will fill it.

[Booldawg]

I think McDonalds have done more for obesity than terrorism over the years.

[VHG]

If you want to see how stupid many of the world are, go and look at lamebook.

This is a web site where people post the silliest and stupidest things that people post on Facebook.

You would not believe what some people post.

http://www.lamebook.com/