{"id":19274,"date":"2013-02-15T06:44:36","date_gmt":"2013-02-15T06:44:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/?p=19274"},"modified":"2013-02-15T06:44:36","modified_gmt":"2013-02-15T06:44:36","slug":"progress-towards-automatic-information-exchange-with-tax-havens-is-inevitable-its-when-not-if","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/2013\/02\/15\/progress-towards-automatic-information-exchange-with-tax-havens-is-inevitable-its-when-not-if\/","title":{"rendered":"Progress towards automatic information exchange with tax havens is inevitable: it’s when, not if"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Economist series on offshore<\/a>, published as a special report this week, has some powerful\u00a0nuggets\u00a0within it.<\/p>\n

I was talking about\u00a0automatic information exchange<\/a> in the Canadian parliament yesterday<\/a>, and it's good to see the Economist reflecting much of what I said. As they note the OECD solution to information exchange, the\u00a0tax information exchange agreement, does not work (as I said yesterday):<\/p>\n

The OECD touted this as a step towards transparency that would also respect individuals\u2019 right to confidentiality as much as possible. But tax investigators complain that the process for getting information is cumbersome and the bar has been set too high. \u201cYou already have to have pretty much all the information you\u2019re after to get the last piece. It\u2019s a catch-22,\u201d says one. That may explain why the number of requests made has been small.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

I've been saying that since 2009<\/a>.<\/p>\n

It is good to see FATCA and its problems discussed too. As they note:<\/p>\n

An OECD tax official describes the law as \u201cawful, in a way, like a nuclear bomb\u201d but also sees it as \u201ca remarkable leap forward for transparency\u201d.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

They're right, but it's going to happen anyway, and spread. As first reported here:<\/p>\n

Inspired by America\u2019s chutzpah, other countries are drawing up similar legislation of their own. Britain is planning to impose a so-called \u201cSon of FATCA\u201d on its dependencies. The Isle of Man has already agreed to this; its chief minister accepts that automatic exchange \u201cis becoming the global standard\u201d. Jersey and others are holding out for now, but will come under increasing pressure to sign up. \u201cIt\u2019s the last days of the Roman Empire,\u201d mutters a senior Cayman lawyer.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Also important is the fact that many of the futile counter arguments to\u00a0automatic information exchange from places like Jersey are dismissed:<\/p>\n

Tax campaigners argue that appropriate checks and balances can be put in place in most countries. Governments in the developing world already have access to lots of sensitive information about their citizens. And the biggest benefit of automatic exchange is that it deters rather than detects, says John Christensen of the Tax Justice Network (TJN).<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Quite so. But then\u00a0places\u00a0like Jersey don't want to deter a trade we want to stop. And that's the simple explanation for the difference of view. You're for or\u00a0against\u00a0deterring\u00a0g tax crime. Some aren't against it. The\u00a0Tax Justice Network is, and it's now very clear that the view of those who think criminality must be stopped will prevail.<\/p>\n

That's why I think we're winning, as the Economist clearly concludes.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Economist series on offshore, published as a special report this week, has some powerful\u00a0nuggets\u00a0within it. I was talking about\u00a0automatic information exchange in the Canadian
 Read the full article…<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[130,32,11],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-19274","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-information-exchange","category-tax-havens","category-tax-justice-network"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19274","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=19274"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19274\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19274"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19274"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19274"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}