About John Christensen
The Price We Pay – interview with director Harold Crooks
Watch the Canadian Brodcasting Company interview with film director Harold Crooks discussing his film The Price We Pay. TweetShare
Britain’s new company registry is a job half done
First, the good news: the UK government has committed to creating a central public register of company ownership following Parliament’s approval of this crucial measure to tackle crime and tax dodging. TweetShare
Quote of the Day on Trickle-Down Economics
Economist John Kenneth Galbraith described trickle-down theory as “the less than elegant metaphor that if one feeds the horse enough oats, some will pass through to the road for the sparrows.” Which pretty much summarises what has happened in practice over the past forty years as the theory has been rigorously applied by giving tax cuts to rich people and
Read the full article…Meet TJN in Oxford to discuss the fallacy of tax “competitiveness”
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People’s Parliament to discuss How Corrupt is Britain?
On Thursday 26th March 2015, the People’s Parliament will meet at Westminster in London to discuss a complex question, How Corrupt is Britain? British people have long prided themselves on having a relatively corruption-free liberal democracy. Corruption, as the old saying goes, is something that happens in another country. TweetShare
The Offshore Wrapper: a week in tax justice #55
Diamonds going cheap Zimbabwe MP James Maridadi has been holding the government’s feet to the fire over suspiciously low tax revenues generated by Zimbabwe’s mining sector. According to the MP the last budget statement predicts that the government will gain no revenue from diamond mining. TweetShare
European Trade Unions Congress on tackling tax evasion, avoidance and tax havens
The European Trade Union Confederation (ETUC) was established in 1973 to represent workers and their national affiliates at the European level. It has just adopted the following resolution on tackling tax evasion, avoidance and tax havens. TweetShare
Quote of the day: the Irish template for corporate bullying
Yesterday, we re-posted a blog about the Irish Celtic Tiger myth from the Fool’s Gold site to the Naked Capitalism blog. The blog seeks to debunk the myth that tax “competition” was crucial to Ireland’s development in the 1980s and 1990s. TweetShare
City of London Corporation in ‘failure to support transparency’ shocker
Father William Taylor, an elected member of the City of London Corporation, has blogged an interesting exchange he had last week with Mark Boleat, who chairs the Corporation’s Policy Committee. The crux of the exchange is that the Corporation will not be supporting the proposal before the UK parliament for a public registry of beneficial ownership (i.e. the true owners
Read the full article…The Next Rising Tax Haven
TJN’s Andres Knobel has just had his article, The Next Rising Tax Haven, published in the Spring edition of the World Policy Journal. As the following extract suggests, the rise and rise of a tiny wealthy elite, who will go to great lengths to avoid paying taxes, means that tax havens are adapting to meet the demands of a plutocratic
Read the full article…The Offshore Wrapper: a week in tax justice #54
By the rivers of BabyLon-don The London property market is awash with offshore cash. Studies from estate agents show that 90% of newly built luxury property is bought by overseas buyers, often acting though an offshore vehicle. TweetShare
Bankers have a moral compass, it just may not look like yours
Guest blog by Jörg Wiegratz, lecturer in political economy of global development, University of Leeds We’re getting rather used to revelations about sharp practice in the banking sector. The row about HSBC’s tax services to rich clients has raised, yet again, crucial questions about the business culture which allows such scandals to emerge. TweetShare
The Offshore Wrapper: a week in tax justice #53
Luxembourg in art attack You’d think tax havens have their hands full with exotic financial products and shell companies. Well now they are trying to cash in on a new form of financial secrecy – high value art. TweetShare
The Tax Justice Research Bulletin – 1(2)
February 2015 This is the second Tax Justice Research Bulletin, a monthly series dedicated to tracking the latest developments in policy-relevant research on national and international taxation. TweetShare
HSBC and the world’s oldest drug cartel
HSBC’s core values are under scrutiny. The bank has been implicated in one scandal after another, and the current leadership claims to be wanting to restore the bank’s reputation. But what reputation do they aim to restore? TweetShare
