US sanctions have taken a big bite out of Russia's economy

US Sanction Mania should not really have too big an impact if the economy is managed correctly. So what if a part of the world is becoming a white space on the world map? Before America was discovered Europe did perfectly well, and same can be said of time before China entered the World economy. What is dangerous is the fact that nobody seems to be man (or woman) enough to put a stop to this encroachment promoted by sinister lobbies and 'think tanks' in the United States.
US sanctions have taken a big bite out of Russia's economy

To Shrink the Trade Deficit With China, Tax Carbon - Bloomberg View

Easier said then done, who is going to do all the calculations? More bureaucrats?
To Shrink the Trade Deficit With China, Tax Carbon - Bloomberg View

EU recommends suspending drugs tested by Indian firm

The shady side of Globalization! And why are call centres located abroad permitted by regulators?
EU recommends suspending hundreds of drugs tested by Indian firm

Sanctions on Russia may backfire

Sanctions seem to have replaced actual warfare as the preferred weapon these days. But are sanctions imposed on Russia in the wake of the annexation of Crimea going to have the intended effect? More than in other cases of (usually futile) sanctions the latest version of sanctions will have little effect - or even backfire on the sponsors in the 'West'. A look at the map makes it clear that Russia is not just any country that can be bossed around 'gunship style'. It is a whole continent! So self-sufficiency should not be a problem. And looking at economic history a period of isolation from the world markets, esp the main economies, should actually do wonders for the development of a competitive domestic industry. Do Russians - the broad mass of people, not the oligarchs - really need to buy BMW's or other high-end luxuries from the West? The USA and Germany have expanded their domestic industries behind tariff walls, and the English navigation act has contributed substantially to the rise of British sea power. Cutting off access to international financial markets will not lead to the default by Russian borrowers as predicted in some places. Russia can simply declare 'Force majeure' and refuse to pay back the loans if they are not rolled over at the behest of unaccountable political lobbies. The USA have only minor trade relationships with Russia, but therefore Russia is not much exposed to any lost trade with that country either. And the EU may be a substantial partner, but the world is large enough, there is China, India, Brazil etc. And if Russia really gets needled too much it can make overtures to Iran and other states therefore setting the cat among the pigeons.

Superrich pay paltry tax in Zurich

News that 97 'Super rich' individuals have left the Swiss canton after a favourable tax treatment for rich foreigners was revoked demonstrates that unfair tax competition is alive and well. The 97 are among 201 rich foreigners that only paid an agreed amount to to canton that was far from representative of their overall global wealth. How little these individuals pay is revealed by the fact, that the departure of the 97 only led to a Swiss Franc 12.2 million diminution of the tax take. This means that each of them paid just around Sfr 100,000 a year. We do not know the aggregate wealth of these persons but we would guess that even Warren Buffett would be even more embarrassed if he could get away with the tax rate these tax fugitives paid. While the canton of Zurich is the loser, there are plenty of other Swiss cantons who still operate a tax haven on a highly selective (and discriminatory) basis. One only has to wonder what purpose the WTO or the OECD serve if they cannot stop this blatant case unfair tax competition. No wonder the Super rich 0.01 per cent are laughing all the way to the bank.

IMF bureaucrats in favor of capital controls

The iron law of bureaucracy manifests itself when the pampered and unelected bureaucrats of the IMF start to allow capital controls as a policy tool for governments that have run out of ideas. The increasingly mad spending spree that has been fostered by politicians of all parties since the early 1970s has hit a wall and rather than realise that their policies are unsustainable the political establishment - cheered on by the media and 'experts' - resorts to more and more desperate measures. When a country starts on the slippery road towards state control there is no way but to progress more and more deeply into a morass of regulation. Each step requires more detailed control, each measure has to be policed, interpreted and so on until each activity is only possible under detailed conditions set by the political 'Kommissars'. Capital controls open a temporary reprieve to the control freaks that dominate our lives already to a large extent and investors are well-advised to take the necessary steps before they and their investments are trapped in some 'welfare paradise' where welfare means a fat political class ruling over a peasant population that is just treated as a tax cow. Already some 'developed' states tax 60 per cent of the average (!) wage earner's income - happy were the days when the 'poor' medieval peasant had to pass a tenth of his produce to his landlord.