By Jon Matonis
Forbes
Thursday, February 14, 2013
http://www.forbes.com/sites/jonmatonis/2013/02/14/france-plans-to-prohibit-cash-payments-over-e1000/
One of the best things about covering payments news is that you never
run out of stories where various myopic governments attempt to restrict
the flow of cash in a squeeze for revenue.
France becomes the latest as Prime Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault plans to erect
new controls on cash transactions in order to tighten up tax collection
and meet the country's optimistic budget deficit target of 3% of GDP.
The government needs euros and they need some fast.
In the government plan labeled "Fight against fraud," France's
fiscal residents would see the cash transaction limit decrease from
€3,000 to €1,000 per purchase. However, in a nod to the exiled wealthy
and what Wolf Richter calls the "Depardieu exception," those fiscal residents of a country other than France
would have their cash transaction limits reduced from €15,000 to
€10,000 per purchase. Legislative measures could be finalized by the end
of 2013.
Richter illustrates the ban's impact with an example of purchasing a used car: "two crisp 500-euro bills and a single coin -- voilà,
an illegal transaction." Used cars could easily cost more than €1,000
and accepting cash protects the seller, but the larger problem may be
finding those 500-euro bills in the first place. While the southern
coast of Spain was once believed to have the highest concentration of 500-euro notes in circulation, the distinctive purple bill has become more like the unicorn of Europe because they are rarely seen. The UK banned the sale of 500-euro notes at exchange offices in 2010.
"It
has long been the dream of collectivists and technocratic elites to
eliminate the semi-unregulated cash economy and black markets in order
to maximise taxation and to fully control markets," writes
Patrick Henningsen at the Centre for Research on Globalization. "If the
cashless society is ushered in, they will have near complete control
over the lives of individual people."
The anti-cashists have
escalated this sad drama to a point where it has become like boiling a
frog. The limits are incrementally lowered and lowered until one day,
people wake up and realize that only fully traceable transactions are
permitted in the new cashless society.
In many regions around the
world, a strong and vibrant cash economy is actually underpinning the
faltering national economies that no longer offer sufficient mainstream
opportunities for their citizens. By some estimates,
the global off-the-grid economy represents $10 trillion worth of
economic activity per year. People will produce, consume, and trade in
order to survive and bearer cash plays a critical role in that process.
The futuristic cashless society is marketed as being ultra-modern and at the forefront of technology. However, it is more like the last gasp of a dying behemoth and it is the poor that will suffer the most.
In responding to Simon's Black's description of Emperor Diocletian's 3rd-century tax reforms in All Transactions To Be Conducted In The Presence Of A Tax Collector, a reader commented
that "Tax evasion always increases along with the tax burden." He
continued, "In fact, it acts as a safety-valve against rebellion. Since
the rich will always have means to escape heavy taxation, the burden of
bloated government bureaucracy will eventually fall the heaviest on
those of lesser means."
Is there anywhere left to go if you don't welcome the fully-traceable cashless society? Spain recently banned cash transactions above 2,500 euros and Italy banned cash transactions above 1,000 euros.
France and other anti-cashist countries could quickly become nations of smurfs, referring to the practice of smurfing, which is a method of structuring cash transactions into smaller deposits of money to avoid cash reporting requirements.
Tuesday, February 19, 2013
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Very good post on Ripple, Bitcoin, and historical credit arrangements. Worth linking to on Forbes.
ReplyDeletehttp://jpkoning.blogspot.kr/2013/02/ripple-or-bills-of-exchange-20.html