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.
What Trump and Cruz Should Learn From Belgium
The day of the attacks, he called for police to “patrol and secure Muslim neighborhoods.” Asked what that meant, Cruz cited a program in New York that, according to The New York Times, allowed to the NYPD to designate “entire mosques as suspected ‘terrorism enterprises,’” and thus “collect the license plate numbers of every car in mosque parking lots, videotape worshipers coming and going, and record sermons using informants wearing hidden microphones.” What Cruz didn’t mention is that an NYPD official himself admitted the program didn’t yield a single terrorism investigation. What it did was alienate law-abiding Muslims. As a Newark-based FBI special agent noted, the program led “people [to] pull back cooperation” and thus impaired “our ability to have our finger on the pulse of what’s going on around the state.”
Compared to countries like Belgium, the degree of acceptance that American Muslims enjoy represents a form of American exceptionalism. Republican presidential candidates like to say Barack Obama doesn’t believe in American exceptionalism and instead wants to make America more like Europe. Yet it’s they who, by demonizing Muslims, would do just that.
New Fences on the Old Continent: Refugee Crisis Pushes Europe to the Brink
Merkel has begun warning of the EU’s disintegration “into small states” that will be unable to compete in a globalized world, as well as of the possibility that border controls might soon be reintroduced all across Europe.
Were Europe in agreement, it would be unproblematic to accommodate 2-3 million refugees, given the Continent’s population of a half billion people. From such a perspective, the current spat actually seems somewhat ridiculous. But in the run up to next week’s EU summit, Europe is gripped by strife. Europe’s greatest achievement, the opening of its borders through the Schengen agreement, is at stake, and the increasingly toxic atmosphere between countries has reached alarming dimensions.
.. Slovakian Prime Minister Robert Fico in turn warned Greece that if the country didn’t move to secure its borders that, “there will be one single hotspot and it will be called Greece.” Perhaps, he added, it may be necessary to sacrifice Greece for the sake of Europe’s well-being.
.. Europe’s weakness, though, is also the product of a Germany that is having trouble fitting into its leadership role on the Continent. For decades, German politicians have sought to eschew expressing Germany’s own interests, instead emphasizing what is best for Europe and trying to be the best Atlanticists possible, exercising restraint when it came to their role in the EU.
.. This changed during the euro crisis. Merkel took advantage of the country’s economic strength in order to pursue German interests.
.. Although Merkel, like many others, initially pushed for the distribution of the refugees across the EU, the German chancellor is now emphasizing border protection as the highest priority.
.. This is why the Greek prime minister has involved the last institution in his country that is still able to act reliably and quickly: the military. Greek soldiers are now to erect tent camps and repurpose barracks as provisional living spaces in Athens, Thessaloniki and elsewhere.
.. He says there was never a time when Greek officials simply “waved refugees through,” as they have been accused of doing. “What are we supposed to do if they don’t want to be here?” he asks.
.. The correct answer only comes following a bit of friendly assistance from the interpreter: “Because we want to ask for asylum in Germany.” “Five for Germany,” the policeman calls out, and waves the Syrians through.
Wrong answers at this point in the journey would be: “I want to go to Germany to work as a teacher,” or “because my brother lives there.” Those who slip up, even just once, are sent back to Slovenia, and from there, if they don’t apply for asylum, onwards to Croatia, Serbia, Macedonia and Greece.
.. In most formerly communist EU member states, the electorates are largely xenophobic and the belief is widespread that refugees would bring epidemics, terrorism and Sharia law into their countries. The influx, many in Eastern Europe believe, is but the advance guard of an expansive Islam seeking to take over the Christian West.
.. The construction of Fortress Europe, which was never supposed to be built, is quite far along in Eastern Europe and in the Balkans. There are fences between Turkey and Bulgaria, between Hungary and Serbia and between Greece and Macedonia. Slovenia has once again begun using Yugoslavia-era customs barracks on the Austrian border.
.. The idea of establishing mandatory refugee quotas for EU member states is dead. Instead, Ankara is to be offered that a “Coalition of the Willing” will accept refugees directly from Turkey, but only after the border is secured — if the country agrees to take back economic migrants.
.. According to a European Commission report, the reintroduction of internal border controls within the Schengen area would reduce EU economic output over a 10-year period by between €500 billion and €1.4 trillion. Just the direct costs for border controls will cost between €5 billion and €18 billion annually.
.. In the concert of large geopolitical powers, individual European countries do not have a loud voice, not even Germany. The United States and China are only interested in the EU as a whole. Size is decisive. If Europe is unable to present itself as a unity, it will be marginalized.
.. The trip took 25 days and was so stressful that Doaa stopped lactating. Her sister Walaa heads off in search of powdered milk.
.. Doaa says that she is so agitated that she can’t sleep anymore, adding that, from what she has seen so far, she isn’t particularly fond of Greece. She says it’s disgusting here and that she has tried to avoid visiting the restrooms. Instead of eating, she smokes.
A New Deal for Europe
the failures to make such reforms are not enough to explain the sudden plunge in GDP in the eurozone from 2011 to 2013, even as the US economy was in recovery. There can be no question now that the recovery in Europe was throttled by the attempt to cut deficits too quickly between 2011 and 2013—and particularly by tax hikes that were far too sharp in France. Such application of tight budgetary rules ensured that the eurozone’s GDP still, in 2015, hasn’t recovered to its 2007 levels.
.. the Erasmus education program—which provides opportunities for students and teachers to study and train abroad—is ridiculously underfunded. It has a budget of two billion euros annually, against the 200 billion euros set aside every year for interest on eurozone debt. We ought to be investing heavily in innovation and young people.
.. If France, Italy, and Spain (roughly 50 percent of the eurozone’s population and GDP, as against Germany, with scarcely more than 25 percent) were to put forth a specific proposal for a new and effective parliament, some compromise would have to be found. And if Germany stubbornly continues to refuse, which seems unlikely, then the argument against the euro as a common currency becomes very difficult to counter.