News & Analysis
Spain Bans Cash
Spain Bans Cash Transactions Over 2,500 Euros ... Spain has outlawed the use of cash in business transactions in excess 2,500 euros in order to crack down on the black market and tax evaders. The motivations behind the push for digital currencies is exposed as Spain heads down the road of the Greeks in combating their sovereign debt crisis. As the government scrambles for every tax dollar it can get its hands on, even though they already gave every Spaniard $23,000 Euros in debt last year alone (approximately $32,500), they are now banning all large cash business transactions. Why? So they can track the transactions and make sure that people and business are paying taxes. Being able to track the transactions is also aimed to combat the growing black market in Spain. – Alexander Higgins' blog
Dominant Social Theme: This cash has gotta go. It's evil.
Free-Market Analysis: They are not even making a pretense anymore that the West is run via market economies. As we have long predicted, the phony "sovereign debt" crisis in Europe is being used to justify all sorts of authoritarian measures.
It is government pols that gladly borrowed what European banks threw at them. And somehow the upshot earlier this week is that Spanish citizens now lose the right to conduct many transactions in cash.
Spectactularly, the reports such as this one, excerpted above, don't even both to hide the real point. The Spanish government wants to ensure that it can "track transactions and make sure that people and businesses are paying taxes."
Of course, anyone who has visited Spain of late knows that the tax burden in Spain is onerous indeed, and is one reason that the truculent tribes that have co-existed uneasily with Madrid are again beginning to beat the drums of secession.
The taxes that the central government levies on small businesses especially are verging on punitive. But there are no apologies. The official position is one of unflinching demands.
It is surely part of a larger meme having to do with a "cashless" society. Just recently the UK Telegraph asked "Is mobile the way we'll all be paying?" The answer, as can be expected, was a qualified yes, but issued in the predictable upbeat way.
The cashless society has been a much-mooted concept ever since consumer credit cards were widely introduced in the 1950s. Now it seems that “mobile money” is the new gold rush. The term – used to describe the way the mobile phone is used to pay for goods – yields no fewer than 126 million results on a Google search ...
Market research firm Yankee Group believes that global mobile transactions will become a $1trillion market by 2015. While Berg Insight says there will be 894m worldwide users of mobile banking by the same year. Peter Ayliffe, chief executive of Visa Europe, who sits on the Monitise board, believes 50pc of all Visa transactions in Europe will be on a mobile device by 2020.
The top men are beginning to issue their predictions. The march to a cashless society has begun. Perhaps we owe Spain a debt of gratitude for revealing the REAL reason for a cashless society. It makes tax collecting so much easier.
But this is only part of the story. Taxes are certainly to be paid ... but the RESULTS of tax payments and the government expenditures they give rise to are seemingly more questionable every day.
In Spain this is certainly evident. The REAL problem that Spain faces as its depression spirals out of control is the infrastructure that politicos built over the past decade. Every small town has bike paths, outdoor parks and other unnecessary public venues that will soon prove, well ... unsupportable.
Gradually, the infrastructure sinks into disrepair, further exacerbating the loss of what was once gratifying. These expanding open sores in civic centers create additional dissonance. Spain has created public places everywhere with giddy exuberance. Soon it will be a kind of national "tragedy of the commons."
There is not much discussion of this plight, however. Most of the conversation centers around putting young people to work. Up to 50 percent of Spanish youngsters are out of work or can't find jobs and many of the rest live in fear that they will lose their positions.
There is now, in fact, starting to be a Diaspora of young people from Spain. Virtually all of South America speaks Spanish – and many countries are doing rather well. Argentina, especially, is attracting youngsters; Chile, too, presumably.
The cash ban is probably looked on by many in Spain as yet one more petty annoyance but these annoyances are piling up over time. When mixed in with the larger difficulty of the dysfunction of the Spanish economy, such issues can surely create an explosive situation. Here's more from the article:
Those who violate the ban will face fines of 25% of the payment made in cash. The Prime Minister, Mariano Rajoy, has announced on Wednesday that the plan to combat tax evasion on Friday approved the Cabinet prohibit the payment in cash transactions of over 2,500 euros and which at least involved a businessman professional.
During the control session the Government in the House of the Congress of Deputies and in response to a question about the tax amnesty made by the general coordinator of IU, Cayo Lara, the Prime Minister, has revealed that those who violate the ban will face fines of 25% of the payment made in cash.
The Government had already advanced the plan to combat fraud limitations include the use of cash for certain operations, although he had not yet specified which would place the threshold (yes at the time there was talk that it could be 1,000 euros for self-employed).
This measure aims to prevent the use of black money in commercial transactions and, in the case of companies, give them an obstacle to not resort to false invoices. The plan to combat fraud adopted on Friday, the Cabinet intends to raise up to 8.171 million euros in 2012.
We can see clearly the conflation between fraud and bad times. Of course, desperate people will do desperate things – and the "austerity" program that the Spanish government is following will only exacerbate matters.
To their credit, Spanish officials have generated some tax-forgiveness programs of late, but these, too, are proving controversial. Spanish politicos, like their counterparts elsewhere, are inclined to accept Brussels' dictates for "austerity" as the ultimate solution to the current mess.
But is it really so simple? As we have often pointed out, the elites running the Southern PIGS were basically bribed by Brussels money to bring their countries aboard the EU. Now that the EU is collapsing, these individuals are nowhere to be found. The citizens are faced with the bill – and with paying back the banks.
Increasingly, we believe, those trapped in this situation are well aware of their manipulation. What we call the Internet Reformation has made them well aware of their manufactured plight. At some point there will be serious repercussions.
This is what the power elite – a few dynastic families behind the EU and much of the world's globalist mischief – may not have entirely anticipated. We have to think that the EU takedown was created to further the aims of globalism. But those at the top did not take into account the dawning realizations that the Internet was capable of generating.
Now the trap has been sprung. The "sovereign debt crisis" is creating a larger globalist presence, puffing up the IMF and creating further EU integration. This was all part of the plan, no doubt.
The move to get rid of cash is also part of the larger plan, we're sure. The idea is for every transaction to be tracked and controlled. The mass of people is to be further disciplined and herded. Global government is to be the result
Conclusion: The mechanism is increasingly transparent. They hardly bother to hide it anymore. But here is our question: Do they believe that people cannot read ... or think? Do they believe people will hold their aggregate resentment in check forever? There seems to be a kind of baiting going on, and it may not end well.
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Posted by amanfromMars on 04/20/12 11:56 AM
Who in their right mind is even going to think about repaying crazily created debt ... ... ... ... Click to view link
And check out the other graphic illustrations at the bottom of the web page too, to get a sense of the foolishness of pretending that the system is not just a means of perverse control of the ignorant.
The problem now though is, that the masses are being educated and are getting wise to the scams which have them as puppets to third party directed fates rather than masters of their own destinies. And boy oh boy, are they gonna have a field day when that reaches its tipping point/reaches critical mass.
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Posted by kenn on 04/20/12 01:19 PM
Note how they (Banksters) demolish one state at a time... First Greece,,, Now Spain,,, Next Italy or whoever... yet no united resistance from the victims! In Greece they're burning their own homes and businesses while their government laughs and invokes more tyranny. If I was to burn something it sure as heck won't be 'my home or business'...
which leads to your question:
Do they believe that people cannot read ... or think? Do they believe people will hold their aggregate resentment in check forever? There seems to be a kind of baiting going on, and it may not end well.
IMO and from what has transpired so far... . a resounding Yes (government educated!), Yes and Yes.
Baiting? Maybe,,, More like taking the point (military vernacular). Basically "Do something,,, See what happens,,, then do something else"
So far their low opinions of the 'little people' seem pretty much on target.
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Posted by finninsweden on 04/20/12 01:32 PM
Maybe the elites are shooting them selves in the foot? €2500 equals to 2 oz of gold. Barter,anyone?
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Posted by fabien_hug on 04/20/12 01:39 PM
I agree with you, people will not revolt. As to those who can read they belong to the elite and they don't really care. Another point, what's the percentage of the population is Spain that is able to systematically fork EUR 2,500 in cash? Divide and conquer is still a valid principle.
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Posted by Frank on 04/20/12 01:43 PM
What's happening in Europe today is a window as to what will happen in the USA soon. Except not only will all cash transactions over a couple thousand US Dollars be banned, rather ALL cash transactions PERIOD will be banned!! No more hiding cash under the mattress (because you fear oncoming bank insolvency). The Federal Government via the IRS will be able to track EVERY penny you spend and what you spend it on. (You don't like Obama or the Democrats & you give to their opposition: JAIL FOR YOU!!... or visa-versa if the big Statist Republicans win control back again).
Not only how you spend your money, but I read yesterday they want to put "black boxes" in cars by 2015. With black boxes & GPS, the Feds can track your every move if they later decide to do so.
We live in a Police State. Our freedoms are about gone. I'm not hopeful that the dumbed-down, government educated & brainwashed sheeple in America will put up much of a fight. They don't know what they lost!
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Posted by amanfromMars on 04/20/12 01:49 PM
kenn, howdy,
Have you any idea how much evidence has been, and is being collected to justify burying the corrupted and outdated elite systems in the holes they are digging, for a new regime to seamlessly take over with a completely new program with entirely different protocols and methodologies, should anyone crawl out of nowhere, totally oblivious to all that has transpired, to ask for justification?
It is overwhelming.
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Posted by Don from the Republic of Lakotah on 04/20/12 02:04 PM
"the infrastructure that politicos built over the past decade. Every small town has bike paths, outdoor parks and other unnecessary public venues that will soon prove, well ... unsupportable."
Politicos are bankster tools. Banksters want their tax donkeys to carry a load one pound short of back-breaking. Underloaded tax donkeys bear mute testimony to the most mortal of bankster sins - "leaving money on the table."
From a bankster perspective, public place infrastructure is a necessary evil. Merely an excuse to foist debt onto tax donkeys then drain the donkeys with yet another AAA muni bond repayment stream.
Selecting the proper excuse is more of an art than a science. Exploiting the dreams of the young proves particularly effective at inducing guilt. Olympic Games with attendant opulent venues, arguably rank as one of the better schemes. For only a heartless miser can say "No!" to the dreams of young Olympians.
It's a perfect scheme. Billions in loans to finance structures used for less than a month. The loans remain standing even if the buildings fall.
Mass media's inevitable "white elephant" brainstorming follows as surely as fall follows summer. Re-imagineering roles for structures that are only suited for providing Olympic venues.
Reply from The Daily Bell
This is very good.
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Posted by victorbarney on 04/20/12 02:38 PM
Not for nothing, but Revelation, chapter 11 speaks of a "CASHLESS SOCIETY" in the LAST DAYS OF MAN. Imagine that? Just saying...
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Posted by oldman67 on 04/20/12 02:48 PM
Millions of people don't seem to be capable of critical thinking as proved in the election of 2008 in America.
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Posted by Old Faithful on 04/20/12 03:46 PM
Western so-called 'democracies' have lost touch with reality and are increasingly disconnected from the constituents they are supposed to serve.
If these governments want to survive, they would be well advised to go down to the streets and LISTEN to what the population is saying, lest they become irrelevant.
Banning cash will ultimately result in their own demise. You simply can't go against natural law: people will find a way to keep on doing what they want, government or not.
Witness the Greeks, who are reintroducing a computer assisted barter system. What better way to completely bypass the tyrannical money system that to establish a parallel, virtual currency system, since the existing one is all virtual anyway, except that is is controlled by the power elite.
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Posted by alexsemen on 04/20/12 04:16 PM
Just talking only talking and nothing betre than talking . There is no as action. The fera is the King and the slaverny is the new religion ! yes will be what I've said 17 yeras ago : worst then all Stalinisme al together !
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Posted by Bischoff on 04/20/12 05:21 PM
"Spain Bans Cash Transactions Over 2,500 Euros ... "
Big woopdy doo... ..
Try deposit or withdraw more than $5,000 per day in the U.S. How about a headline for that... ???
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Posted by nithsdale on 04/20/12 06:59 PM
Spain is just followng the USA... We put limits on cash too. Try taking it out of the USA and if you draw cash to buy a car... well,it might take days to get it!
Spain has its own ways of doing things. First, Spaniards don't pay taxes until they are caught. Second, the Spanish peseta was a great second currency for all kinds of northern Europeans to hold when their own "cash" was in question and there has been a continuing market in those "old" bills ever since. This is the only Spanish cash the Spanish government can interdict! Have you all forgotten that the Euro, even in Spain, is now european universal!
The PIGS are playing with bank accounts, not cash. The moves in Italy and Spain now are aimed not at Italians and Spaniards, but at the others living amongst them... .all the rest of the world. If you have a home in either country and you, of necessity, must pay bills in your home country... well you are going to get nailed!
No one travels today with cash. It is all cards. Most transactions are below the amounts being set so it is all cautionary, not actual. The people who may have to pay are those who have extravagant tastes or perhaps trying to transfer money by buying elsewhere some item easily returned for cash. The tax on those transfers will have a deleterious effect on the high end luxury business but it will be the same on both sides of the borders so it is that business' problem, not ours.
We have been watching PR in action, not economics!
Reply from The Daily Bell
We were in Spain. What's going on is not PR.
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Posted by runderwo on 04/20/12 08:07 PM
Hacktivists in the frontline battle for the internet
Click to view link
John Perry Barlow, lyricist for the Grateful Dead and co-founder of the well-known advocacy group Electronic Frontiers Foundation (EFF), says the over-arching motivation of such efforts, whatever tactics are used, was to shift the nature of society.
"What unites these groups is the belief that the future is not about vertical, hierarchical government, but horizontal [peer-to-peer] government," he said. "This pits the forces of the information age against those of the industrial age, as we move from scarcity of information to abundance. The last year has established our ability to have revolutions, but not to govern in their wake - but that's coming."
[..]
Barlow is planning the establishment of a foundation aimed at funding any organisations affected by corporate blockades with first amendment implications.
"We hope it makes a moral argument against these sorts of actions," he says. "But it could also be the basis of a legal challenge. We now have private organisations with the ability to stifle free expression. These companies have no bill of rights that applies to their action - they only have terms of service."
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Posted by Agent Pete 8 on 04/21/12 12:01 AM
Headline:
"Barter and alternative exchange happens between people"
F^~% the bank(s)? why of bourse IT will/should.
Evolution...
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Posted by Bischoff on 04/21/12 12:56 AM
"Barter and alternative exchange happens between people"
Next headline... "Finally, man back to Ice Age hunting and killing, hand-to-mouth economy"
Devolution...
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Posted by amanfromMars on 04/21/12 01:37 AM
The nature of society has shifted, runderwo, but even as it shifts from Power Elite hierarchical verticality, does peer-to-peer horizontalism also require a definitive leadership to show and share direction with transparent purpose. And the secret trick there in those fields, is to also always ensure and assure that it is selfless, and that should also always be demonstrably so for boundless, super rapide progress.
[blockquote]Posted Saturday 21st April 2012 03:39 GMT amanfromMars 1 …. Click to view link
Re: Feel the fear, which when fear is manufactured, allows one serial fondlings in its follies.
[i][b]I don't think the HO* is that stupid[/b]... ... .. AC Posted Friday 20th April 2012 16:40 GMT [/i]
The mistake which is easily made, AC, is to imagine and accept that the HO is bright and can lead in a world/worlds in which the smarter being realises they lead with the free sharing of sensitive information and novel intelligence. Secrets hidden from general view and filed away in secure vaults and known to a select committee of a few are/is not where power and control lie and come from. Future globally shared content is that which trumps all and that which everything reacts to.
And the quite perfect enough vehicles for that are Invisible and Anonymous Intangible Networks InterNetworking JOINT Applications. ... ... ... .Creative Virtual Currents Phorming and Carrying Colossal Clouds with Titanic Rain for Perfect Storms. ... ... ... which when bottled and marketed for sale has the distinct fragrance and unmistakeable air of Enigma Station XSSXXXX Ware about IT.[/blockquote]
*HO = Home Office ... .Click to view link
One normally only goes into government whenever one cannot make it in the real world and one must rely on inventing scams which support projects and programs which pilfer from the public purse and impoverish nations?
Sure only a couple of days ago, did Austere Britain which is told it is in serious debt and has no money to spare for essential and failing services at home, loan the IMF another 10,000,000,000 to raise the earlier gift to a total now of 40,000,000,000. And everyone knows that wars are not cheap and are horrendously expensive but the muppets and puppets in government have no problem with rushing headlong into armed conflict with anyone who has inferior toys and weapons and natural resources it covets.
But such skullduggery only last a short while while people are ignorant of the ploy. Education and better intelligence sets them free to create a whole new picture with many new orderly worlds in which to play Greater Games.
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Posted by amanfromMars on 04/21/12 05:55 AM
Or alternatively, Bischoff, a velvet revolutionary headline ... . "Finally, man discovers future intelligence for peaceful and creative co-existences in brave new orderly world programs" ... ... . which you may like to know are in existence and easily readily delivered with CyberIntelAIgent Command and Control of IT and Media Channels of Communication with Computers and SMART Virtual Drivers in Clouds Hosting Advanced Operating Systems ... . CHAOS.
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Posted by dave jr on 04/21/12 08:14 AM
"... prohibit the payment in cash transactions of over 2,500 euros and which at least involved a businessman professional."
Thats right! It is that dastardly businessman professional that needs to be clamped down. They wouldn't want to step on any toes in the drug trade. That could cause some serious repercussions.
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Posted by Bischoff on 04/21/12 10:17 AM
Again... .that Mars babble... ..
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