Word: taxing
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Swiss banking giant UBS takes its name from the first initials of the company's original moniker Union Bank of Switzerland. But over the past few months the Swiss have begun to joke that the acronym should stand for United Bandits of Switzerland. Fury over a tax scandal and massive losses thanks to UBS's exposure to the toxic subprime market in the U.S. is growing fast. "Those arrogant and greedy bankers are tarnishing our image," says Marie-Claire Favre between sips of her cappuccino in a Lausanne cafe. Standing in front of UBS's Lausanne office, Bernard Thevenoz...
Prompted by the tax evasion scandal, the Swiss are now in the middle of a national re-examination of banking industry regulations. An increasing number of voices are speaking up against banking secrecy, which, under the current law, can only be lifted if a client is suspected of defrauding tax authorities, rather than merely not declaring all assets. Recent polls show that 56% of Swiss now support helping foreign countries identify tax evaders, up from just 20% last year. Even some ministers and bankers agree that changes to the 75-year-old law might be necessary to avoid continued pressure...
...rescue effort with the stimulus package recently signed into law by President Barack Obama. In the U.S., despite all the talk about shovel-ready construction projects, only about $100 billion of the $787 billion in stimulus spending will go toward new infrastructure this year. Another $282 billion goes to tax cuts or rebates, much of which, as economist Nouriel Roubini argues, will most likely be saved, not spent. A big chunk of the rest of the package will go, via the states, toward social services: increased unemployment benefits, more money for food stamps and for health-care spending...
...downturn has slowed growth, but it has not stopped it. To make Brazil even more business-friendly, the government is spending $263 billion on tax breaks and infrastructure. Like Lula's social projects, the Growth Acceleration Program, which began in 2007, was funded largely by high commodity prices, most of which have now plummeted. But Brazil seems to have invested the windfall smartly. Exports have been diversified so as to reduce reliance on commodities, and before the downturn the nation socked away a record $208 billion in foreign reserves. The banking system has remained well regulated, and so far seems...
...that appearances don't matter at all. Geithner was chosen as Treasury Secretary over the rough-edged but more experienced former Treasury chief Larry Summers in part because Geithner was considered a smoother salesman. And Geithner will always be saddled with the hard-to-explain $34,000 tax shortfall that almost cost him the nomination. For now, though, Democrats are defending the Treasury Secretary against the bad reviews. "Every Administration official responding to this economic crisis, especially Treasury Secretary Geithner given his role, is working under the equivalent of an electron microscope that dramatically magnifies everything," says Rep. Jim McDermott...