Swissinfo is reporting today that:
Finance Minister Eveline Widmer-Schlumpf has said Switzerland cannot make further concessions to Germany and the United States in a row over untaxed funds.
She said the status quo would be a better option if the German parliament refused to accept the amended agreement signed by both countries last week.
The revised deal which includes higher tax rates designed to regularise untaxed funds held by German residents in undeclared Swiss bank accounts.
However, German opposition parties have vowed to reject the treaty.In an interview in Friday's edition of the Neue Zürcher Zeitung newspaper, Widmer-Schlumpf said the same was true for talks with Washington.
“There is a threshold beyond which we cannot go as a sovereign state,” she said.
I guess most people would think the point where a state would not go was in not supporting criminal activity.
But clearly the Swiss intend to use crime as the basis of their banking sector's activity.
Why the EU has simply said that all Swiss banks will lose their licence to operate in the EU unless the Swiss cooperate is beyond me. Likewise, why and anti-money laundering rules Switzerland and its banks are just blocked as recipients for funds is again beyond me. It's such a simple sanction. And it would work in about 48 hours.
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As was pointed out:
“There is a threshold beyond which we cannot go as a sovereign state,”
That includes the right to enact the laws the Swiss people vote on. One of these laws is that tax fraud is illegal (ie, deliberately falsifying a tax return), while tax evation (ie, failing to disclose taxable income) is not illegal.
You say:
“I guess most people would think the point where a state would not go was in not supporting criminal activity.”
But that is the point. It is not a crime in Switzerland. It is a crime according to the British/EU definitions you are imposing on a non-british, non-eu country. I am not looking at the ethics of this, simply the right for the Swiss to self determine, and in that regard what Switzerland is doing can only be defined as illegal according to countries that do not have a say in its voting, parliament, society, or economy.
Ah, the apartheid was legal and so acceptable defence is rolled out
Very politely, some crime cannot be legitimised by legislation
Those who argue otherwise have been responsible for most of the massive abuses of the last century
Yes, but was it foreign governments that ended the apartheid? or the brave actions of South Africa’s citizens (namely de Klerk and Mandela). Nothing came of the foreign sanctions that were imposed in varying forms for 30 years. I also find it very difficult to reconcile the granting of a fundamental human freedom (all people treated equally) with the taking away of a freedom (the right of a foreign nation to take away the rights of the Swiss)
Crime is by default what the law defines it as. Crime can only be defined within the law. Otherwise it is whatever someone may say it is. Hardly a very predictable of desirable result.
You last comment is bit hysterical. The massive abuses of the last century have been caused by a lot more than one reason, and I would point out that some of the biggest losses of life in the last century have been from the implementation of communism.
How wrong you are.
Crime is defined in the Oxford dictionary as:
crime |krīm|
noun
an action or omission that constitutes an offense that may be prosecuted by the state and is punishable by law : shoplifting was a serious crime.
– illegal activities : the victims of crime.
– an action or activity that, although not illegal, is considered to be evil, shameful, or wrong : they condemned apartheid as a crime against humanity | it’s a crime to keep a creature like Willy in a tank.
See note at sin .
ORIGIN Middle English (in the sense [wickedness, sin] ): via Old French from Latin crimen ‘judgment, offense,’ based on cernere ‘to judge.’
You seemingly ignore all the great wisdom add moral traditions. They may be an explanation for that – most likely that you and your philosophy conflict with them, as neoliberalism does. But crime is not as you describe it.
And the communism to which you refer was explicitly included in the description I offered – I condemn it out of hand.
Surely we do the same thing, isn’t crime the basis for much of the activity in the City of London? And as for the inactivity of the EU, does it not exist primarily to further the interests of the bankers?
Should that be “Why the EU has simply NOT said”? Also “and its banks are NOT just blocked as recipients”?
Apologies
You are right
Written in haste
Being mildly dyslexic I do things like that. I amazes me not just that you produce as much as you do but that it is of a consistent quality.
Richard, you continue to ignore, at your own perils, that the EU remains deeply divided on the issue of banking privacy (and on about everything else). The probability of this ever being agreed and implemented at EU level, where the unanimity among members would be necessary, is strictly zero. Just look at the amendments to the ESTD; there is no major disagreement about their substance, and yet after five years of trying we are still far from seeing them implemented.
Relying on the EU will always be a rather desperate strategy. Try to deal with reality.
You forget paradigm shifts
They happen
You ignore them at your peril