Nancy Folbre, who recently joined the Levy Institute roster as senior scholar, was interviewed by Dollars & Sense on the topic of how conventional economics and policymaking deal with (or rather, fail to deal with) household and caring labor….Multiplier Effect
The ultimate goal is clear: through incremental steps, to create uniform global tax standards and rules to allow governments to track and tax every penny we earn, spend or save. This should be comforting news, for if there’s one thing we’ve learnt in the wake of the Global Financial Crisis, it is that banks and governments can always be trusted to look after the people’s money.
Indeed, according to Turkey’s finance minister Mehmet Şimşek, global tax authorities should be given even more power:"The mark of the beast."
The G-20 has launched efforts to encourage all jurisdictions to sign the Multilateral Convention on Mutual Assistance in Tax Matters, developed jointly by the Council of Europe and the OECD. But more must be done to combat the informal economy. I can easily imagine bilateral agreements – and then a multilateral agreement – that establishes a unique global tax ID for all taxpayers.A tax ID for each and every global citizen! That way we can be taxed wherever we are. Registration will no doubt be quick and painless, and once you’re in the system, escape will be next to impossible – a little like trying to leave the euro zone. And the ultimate target, as Şimşek is not shy to admit, is the informal economy.
Castronova notes that among young people, the mental accounting on different sorts of "money" is already very fuzzy. "Twenty-year-olds don't see any difference at all between dollars, gold coins, GPAs," said Castronova. "They're all just digital score sheets".The Guardian
The future of money may or may not include a Federal Reserve Bank of Amazon, but it probably does involve the gradual decentralisation and democratisation of currency. Virtual currencies aren't just a new-fangled sort of Monopoly money. Rather, they may just be the thing that ends the monopoly on money.
ROME, Jan 10 (Reuters) - Organised crime has tightened its grip on the Italian economy during the economic crisis, making the Mafia the country's biggest "bank" and squeezing the life out of thousands of small firms, according to a report on Tuesday.Extortionate lending by criminal groups had become a "national emergency", said the report by anti-crime group SOS Impresa.
Read the rest (short) at the Harvard Business Review
The idea that an itinerant New York City candy vendor pulls in $150 a day ought to have spawned one of the great feel-good financial news stories of 2011.
