BRUSSELS, Apr 30 (IPS) - Tax havens in Europe are depriving poor countries of more money than they receive in development aid, it has been alleged.Some 11.5 trillion (million million) dollars is held in offshore accounts across the world, according to Tax Justice Network, a grouping of economists, accountants and academics. Because tax authorities are unable to touch this money, they effectively lose 250 billion dollars per year: the equivalent of five times what the United Nations estimated in 2002 as needed to finance its Millennium Development Goals of reducing poverty. John Christensen, the network's spokesman, argues that the European Union has a "slightly schizophrenic" attitude towards the problems posed by massive tax evasion and avoidance. While EU institutions have been "leading the world" in taking some initiatives against tax competition, many of the world's most notorious tax havens are located within the EU or on the overseas territories of its member states, he noted. These include the City of London (the financial district of London), Luxembourg, the Cayman Islands, Jersey and Guernsey. Christensen, who has previously worked in Jersey's banking sector, cited data from the University of Massachusetts suggesting that Africa has lost 607 billion dollars because of capital flight -- or five times the amount it has received in development aid -- since 1970. Capital flight involves the movement of money from one country to another where a firm believes he or she will get greater returns.
Christensen, who has previously worked in Jersey's banking sector
Christensen used to be the Economic Adviser to the
States of Jersey
and he told me he resigned over the way that Price Waterhouse and Ernst & Young got the Jersey LLP legislation through this largely unelected Corporacy.
Globalisation and its discontents: accounting firms buy Limited Liability Partnership legislation in Jersey
You couldn't make it up.... "Any economic unit can emit money. The serious problem is to get it accepted" Hyman Minsky
EUROPE: Tax Havens Cheating the Poor
According to Christensen, Britain is one of the main culprits in attracting capital flight by leaving financial services companies in the City of London to a significant extent unregulated. "The City of London is the biggest tax haven in the world," he said. "Britain is very happy to attract capital out of Africa, Asia and Latin America. And the City of London is not asking was this capital the proceeds of crime, embezzlement or fraud."
After all, if you deal with these crooks, you're obviously up to no good. So it encourages good behaviour. But this would require a transparency that glob-corps pay politicians handsomely to prevent. keep to the Fen Causeway
good image! feed in life, out comes glob ~"When an inner situation is not made conscious, it appears outside as fate." Karl Jung~
take away all the money made from selling tyrants guns and fiddling money, how big a cheese is england then?
pinpoint that, and the anglo disease as model gets its legs shot out from under it.
that's why i think it's pointless trying to make europe a military superpower, it would suck so much out of the often failing social services, it's be a slow trainwreck. ~"When an inner situation is not made conscious, it appears outside as fate." Karl Jung~
