Current Events
<Others take a darker view of US motives. Jack Blum, a Washington lawyer who co-wrote a 1998 report for the United Nations on the offshore phenomenon, says US policy has been influenced by the fact that "the hot money from the rest of world fueled one of the greatest booms in the stock market" and the fact that big brokerage firms "find it profitable to run private banking operations for rich people all over the world who don't want to pay taxes." He estimates that at least $70 billion in US taxes is evaded annually through offshore accounts. That is just above the $65 billion in the projected federal budget for education, training, employment and social services. Elsewhere, Oxfam International calculates that money sucked out of developing countries to tax havens is $50 billion a year, nearly the size of the $57 billion annual global aid budget. Says Joseph Stiglitz, former chief economist of the World Bank, "You ask why, if you believe there's an important role for a regulated banking system, do you allow a nonregulated banking system to continue? The answer is, it's in the interests of some of the moneyed interests to allow this to occur. It's not an accident; it could have been shut down at any time."
