Thursday, May 21, 2009

Tax Havens Onshore

From the New York Times.com:

Few here in Switzerland have been other than disgusted by the behavior of UBS and many of us have moved money away from that bank in protest. However, your editorial “The Swiss and their secrets” (May 16) supports demands that are of dubious legality.

Were the Americans to practice what they preach, the I.R.S. would investigate its own tax havens of Delaware, Wyoming and Nevada, the latter having allowed some 80,000 dummy companies to be anonymously registered in 2008 alone, presumably for U.S. tax evasion reasons.

Moreover, a long overdue overhaul of tortuous U.S. tax laws might prove more productive than attacks on a foreign bank; many of the 52,000 U.S. customers of UBS whose names your editorial asks for might then be happy to head home.