Panama Papers: Act now. Don’t wait for another crisis
Financial secrecy represents a huge threat to the fragile global system, and we won’t solve the problem by politely asking tax havens to stop behaving badly
The good news is that there is a way out of the current political impasse. If four countries, France, Germany, Italy and Spain, who together account for over 75% of the GDP and the population in the eurozone put forward a new treaty based on democracy and fiscal justice, with as a strong measure the adoption of a common tax system for large corporations, then the other countries would be forced to follow them... In other words, we continue to live under the illusion that the problem will be resolved on a voluntary basis, by politely requesting tax havens to stop behaving badly. It is urgent to speed up the process and impose heavy trade and financial sanctions on countries which do not comply with strict rules.
.. why have governments done so little since 2008 to combat financial opacity? The simple answer is that they were under the illusion that there was no need to act. Their central banks had printed enough currency to avoid the complete collapse of the financial system, thus avoiding the mistakes which post-1929 led the world to the brink of complete collapse. The outcome is that we have indeed avoided a widespread depression but in so doing we have refrained from the necessary structural, regulatory and fiscal reforms.