One solution to the economic woes of the West?

[NormanH]

[IMG]http://i253.photobucket.com/albums/hh80/bfb_album/richtax_zps91c7e1bd.jpg[/IMG]

[NormanH]

I was a day ahead of this Guardian report [:)]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2013/apr/03/offshore-secrets-offshore-tax-haven

[Quillan]

I read it this morning and thought it was a very skilfully crafted article which says a lot without saying anything. It is not where the money ends up that is important, it is where it came from and how it got to where it is. Some people have earned their money quite legitimately paid tax in the country in which it has been earned then put their money offshore because they don't want their wealth spread all over the national and international newspapers.

Immediately you mention offshore companies and low or zero tax countries we all immediately believe, because we are programmed to, that people are doing something illegal when many are not. Of course there will always be a minority who do abuse the system but we should be careful not to label them all the same. For instance I know more than one person who has an offshore account in the Channel Islands (previously thought of as a tax haven) because they want a Euro account with their bank for when they are in France, Barclays is one of many that offer these type of accounts.

The other thing is, if you read the article, that it creates an income for the government of the BVI making the BVI self sufficient and also creates employment in the UK (those organising these accounts) who get paid a salary and pay tax in the UK.

Why are we so interested in how much money a person has? I would suspect that if you asked anyone on the forum how much they have in their bank account(s) they would tell you where to go.

If the Guardian wants to create some form of scandal with this, which is what I think they want to do, then so be it but those whose names have been published will simply move their money elsewhere.

I think that the Guardian and other media publishers would be far better off and seen in a far better light if they campaigned and lobbied to ensure loopholes that allow certain coffee shops, Internet book selling companies, mobile phone companies etc are closed and recuperate some or all of the tax that has been lost because of said loopholes.

[woolybanana]

Well, the Guardian has always traded on 'them and us' politics, trying to create jealousy and division by deliberately setting the so called poor against the rich. The former are depicted as poor, deprived and downtrodden, because of the latter who are not paying their taxes, because they are hiding their money offshore.

Yet most Guardian readers live off the State in one form or other and are only too happy to take undeserved handouts to keep their mouths shut, vote increases in their own package paid for by the taxpayer, and to retire on unaffordable gold plated pensions.

Of course there are crooks hiding their money offshore, but then the Italians have just taken €1.3billion off a mafia boss in Sicily, invested in windfarms, and there is reported to be a sudden rise in the number of French politicians officials and politicians booking tickets to Geneva this week.

If governments got it through their thick heads that excessive taxes (eg 75% in France) are the major cause of capital flight then they would find that people would not be averse to paying fair amounts of tax. It is too easy for the French government, for example to use offshore capital flight as a cover for the wasteful, stupid and undemocratic spending of their profligate state. This applies to much of Europe I suspect.

[Mr Ceour de Lion II]

I've always seen the Guardian as being the left's version of the Mail.

I think it is as extreme to the left as the Mail is to the right. I happily sit in the centre, perhaps a little to the right.