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EU Commissioner Renews Call for Serious Fines in Data Privacy Laws
DW100 writes "Despite Google being fined €900,000 by Spanish authorities and €150,000 in France for its controversial privacy policies in recent months, an EU commissioner has admitted this is mere 'pocket money' to the company. Instead, a new legal regime that would have seen Google fined $1bn for breaching data protection laws is needed to make U.S. companies fear and respect the law in Europe. 'Is it surprising to anyone,' asked Commissioner Viviane Reding, 'that two whole years after the case emerged, it is still unclear whether Google will amend its privacy policy or not? Europeans need to get serious. And that is why our reform introduces stiff sanctions that can reach as much as 2% of the global annual turnover of a company. In the Google case, that would have meant a fine of EUR 731 million (USD 1 billion). A sum much harder to brush off.'"
The EU is also responsible for the Data Retention Directive. Worse, most of their spy agencies are just as bad as the NSA. When you combine that with the lack of free speech in many EU countries it doesn't paint a pretty picture.
They're going to force companies to keep user data on EU soil. Which sounds nice, but that means they can force companies to keep your data for as long as they want and hand it all over to "law enforcement" when you've done something inconvenient. They will then have things like search results censored. (See Google France) I hate to say it, but people in the EU have even less privacy than those of us in the US. Even with/especially because of these privacy directives.
So lets pretend that we've just completed writing this code, as opposed to having just completed sabotaging it -Altera
You're a fucking moron.
Or even better, just tell google they have to stop selling services in Europe for a period of time, say 90 days. So nobody in Europe would be allowed to buy ads off Google while the ban was in place.
This would give competitors, who presumably adhere to EU law, a chance to step in and earn some revenue of their own.
Always getting in the way of the free market capitalism that could exploit all of that information on people.
Why won't they think of the corporate people?
Finally, some restrictions on the mining of "big data". Some people have a HUGE problem with its collection and storage by greedy, sleazy, single minded corporations. Not to mention the fact that government goons can store and search that data however they please. Privacy is a human right. If you are willing to use it as currency to purchase shiny, you are part of the problem.
Brave Sir Robin ran away. ("No!") Bravely ran away away. ("I didn't!")
Remove all the services, and only leave them search. See how the people of the EU like that.
That would be cool, but won't necessarily get Google off the hook: tracking/profiling the searches would still be a privacy violation.
Questions raise, answers kill. Raise questions to stay alive.
Yes, it sure would suck for EU tech companies to suddenly have a few hundred million customers with a well-defined and established need in a market where the incumbent dominant player has just decided to quit. I am sure that their bank managers would complain about them putting more into their accounts than they were expecting and their politicians would be very upset by all of that money flowing in their economies instead of going to the US.
I am TheRaven on Soylent News
FTFY
Yeah, EU companies would NEVER do the double-dutch to save on their tax bill, because taxes are at a much more reasonable level in the EU compared to the US.
Sleep your way to a whiter smile...date a dentist!
Note that I didn't say anything about taxes. Even if the company is avoiding all of its taxes, if its infrastructure and employees are all based in the EU then that's money circulating in the EU, which is of net benefit to the local economy and likely to result in local benefits and even in more total tax revenue. This is a big part of the reason why countries try to give companies tax breaks: even if none of the money is paid directly in taxes, it's better to have it circulate locally than to be sent elsewhere. This worked a lot better when you got a factory employing ten thousand people for your multimillion dollarpound tax break, rather than a datacenter employing 50...
I am TheRaven on Soylent News
The ad companies will cry foul and make websites give messages saying how the evil socialist EU regime is taking this website away. Please email X to tell them to reverse this law etc.
Since they are injecting Chrome with malware and adware through buying extensions and now circumventing adblock plus and making javascript fail to load if they detect blockers I would not put this past them.
http://saveie6.com/
Not legal. When it comes to the question whether something "illegal" is done by a company, three things get taken into consideration:
1. What it costs to avoid the fine (or the profit to be had by ignoring the law, respectively)
2. Amount to pay when you get caught.
3. Chance to get caught.
That's it. And before someone asks, yes, risk management is part of my job, and these are essentially the considerations when it comes to laws. More and more often law changes get dumped on my desk rather than legal because we no longer avoid breaking the law by default, we check whether it pays to break it.
You'd be surprised how often it does...
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
... that "do no evil" has been revised.
The biggest stick that can be used against them isn't even cash - they are fighting tooth and nail against being forced to put a notice on their front page admitting wrongdoing.
Watch this Heartland Institute video
You mean, like, in the US? Damn those socialists!
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Solution: Fine them for random stuff for a lot of money.
This isn't random stuff.
Just because the US doesn't know what proper consumer protection and privacy laws are doesn't mean it isn't important.
Except the new fine won't apply to Google. Google was fined previously for changing the privacy policy with insufficient notification and explanation of the change, not because they were actually violating anything other than a notification requirement.
Unbelievable. Only desperate government bureaucrats could possibly look at administrative fines as a source of income that might save the EU from its financial woes. Excessive taxes, fines, and other means of taking money from the people they are supposed to protect are not the keys to prosperity.
Reality check: Big companies are not the people the European governments are supposed to protect. That are still the citizens of thoes countries. And the rights of those citizens are ignored by Google et. al.
So the governments are actually doing exactly what they should: Protect the rights of the citizens.
Yes, it sure would suck for EU tech companies to suddenly have a few hundred million customers with a well-defined and established need in a market where the incumbent dominant player has just decided to quit. I am sure that their bank managers would complain about them putting more into their accounts than they were expecting and their politicians would be very upset by all of that money flowing in their economies instead of going to the US.
Except the part where the EU has nothing waiting in the wings that comes anywhere near to the package Google offers.
Lets face it, Google cutting off the EU would bring the continent to its knees for months and months.
Yandex couldn't possibly scale fast enough, and the EU threatening Yandex with silly fines could see great segments of
the EU suddenly without enough gas to warm a teapot.
Google's privacy troubles all started when they consolidated them into ONE manageable control panel, rather than
10 or 12 individual policies that were unworkable.
How much does the EU want for free?
Sig Battery depleted. Reverting to safe mode.
Solution: Fine them for random stuff for a lot of money.
This isn't random stuff.
Just because the US doesn't know what proper consumer protection and privacy laws are doesn't mean it isn't important.
Indeed. It's interesting that a lot of Americans respond to stories like this mostly with "zomg taxes!" It's almost as if you can't even imagine there is really an aspect of consumer protection involved. That says something about what you guys expect from government, methinks.
Conversely I think this goes some way to explaining why a lot of Europeans don't actually mind taxes, certainly not as reflexively and dogmatically as many Americans seem to oppose them: they believe that these payments, or at least a part of them, will be spent toward their wellbeing.
Gosh, thanks. That must be why the other ships call me Meatfucker -- GCU Grey Area (Eccentric)
Why do they want to target Google? What are the practical problems caused by the data collection?
In well functioning economies, "circulating money" is a sign of lots of useful economic activity. Such useful activity happens when companies make things people want.
But you're confused about cause and effect: you can't make an economy function well by forcing money to circulate. You and I can play ping pong with our wallets and circulate money between us all day long and nobody is going to benefit. If you tax that activity, the money will disappear entirely.
"Better" in what sense? The people back then had a much lower standard of living, their work was harder and more dangerous. And fewer people were working overall.
Because in Economics 101, we all learn that if we force goods (and hence money) to circulate within a country and to stop them from crossing borders, everybody is so much better off than if we let them engage in trade! Protectionism, yeah! It's worked so well!
i wish i could mod this "funny AND sad"
Except the part where the EU has nothing waiting in the wings that comes anywhere near to the package Google offers. Lets face it, Google cutting off the EU would bring the continent to its knees for months and months.
Not at all. Microsoft adds a few thousand servers to Bing, sells a copy of their server software to Amazon and Apple, and we'll never need Google again.
keeping the data in EU means two very great things for me. 1) NSA must work harder to get it on their grubby hands , whereas with US firm they jsut need to ask 2) I can check the data and ask for rectification and so forth as an EU citizen, but good luck doing that in the US 3) it is much harder to market "me" in the Eu than it is in the US. My data you see cannot be sold that easily. 4) US law enforcement can pretty much run roughshed on my data in the US anyway so it isn't as if the EU law enforcement would be any worst
,2 and 3 , and give my finger in the general direction of US firm and the NSA. Thank you.
AS an EU citizen I'll take that convenience of 1
So back at you.
C. Sagan : A demon haunted world:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0345409469/
visit randi.org
The only segment Google is really market leader by quality is IMO search. For all other areas (Mail, News, Social networks, Maps, Mobile OS, whatever) there are technically equally good or even better alternatives, for most areas even within Europe. (Mail-providers are available for ages, for social networks Facebook is not European but more widely used than Google+ while Diaspora would be a technically better solution than either of them, for Mobile OS there is SailfishOS [Yes, with an Android compatibility layer to let Android-Apps run; not because Android is better but because it has more market share by now and would be difficult to catch up], Meego and others, for Maps we have HERE and Openstreetmap). These alternatives are not widely used due to Googles market dominance, but they are good and available. I'm not sure what the impact would be if Google Search would vanish, but I think we will survive.
Trolling is a art!
Indeed. It's interesting that a lot of Americans respond to stories like this mostly with "zomg taxes!"
Clearly you don't watch a lot of TV... because that's the only way you'd find this observation interesting. Mass media has conditioned them to react that way.
That says something about what you guys expect from government, methinks.
Our already low standards can always be revised downward. It's called aging. When you're in 5th grade, you think you got a pretty good idea about how the government works, and it seems like an alright system. By the time you graduate from college, you have this suspicion that the country is run by morons. When you hit your 30s... you're certain of it.
#fuckbeta #iamslashdot #dicemustdie
Reality check: Big companies are not the people the European governments are supposed to protect.
Correct! Big companies in Europe are the "people" the European governments are supposed to protect. -_-
So the governments are actually doing exactly what they should: Protect the rights of the citizens.
False. They're protecting their own economic interests. Google is an American company that pays little (if any) taxes to Europe. Europe's governments therefore have an incentive to try to lock Google out via cumbersome and expensive legislation to encourage a European competitor to emerge. But I love how you think there's a government out there who honestly cares about the "rights of the citizens". If only there were some historical document [the] illustrating how [declaration] often that [of] happens we [independence] could look at.
#fuckbeta #iamslashdot #dicemustdie
That says something about what you guys expect from government, methinks.
Very little indeed, which is why we're actually doing better than you guys.
Better in what way, exactly? As a blanket statement this seems meaningless to me...
If Americans were "reflexively" against taxes, they wouldn't be collecting so many of them and the top marginal income tax rates would come down. Right now, they're higher than in Germany and the Netherlands (where you seem to be from), but Europeans don't figure that out because they don't even understand how the tax systems work.
Well, suppose I think it might be more complicated than what you're saying, which seems to amount to "Europeans are too stupid to understand US or even their own tax systems". Top bracket income in the Netherlands is at 52%, the number I just found for the US is 39%.
Of course with all the various accounting tricks and outright evasion, available on both sides of the Atlantic, nobody in that top bracket actually pays anything near these respective amounts. I seem to remember Warren Buffet making a point of saying he paid less taxes, proportionally, than his secretary, post-loopholes.
Conversely I think this goes some way to explaining why a lot of Europeans don't actually mind taxes
I think a better explanation is that the average European voter is even less informed than the average American voter.
Based on what? I'm certainly not about to argue that the average European is intrisically better informed than his US counterpart, but I don't see any evidence for the reverse either.
Gosh, thanks. That must be why the other ships call me Meatfucker -- GCU Grey Area (Eccentric)
Even though your ranting makes no logical sense, you wanted a citation and I want to help you out.
Here you go: http://ec.europa.eu/competition/cartels/statistics/statistics.pdf
EU made rules. The companies agreed to the rules. If you break the rules - guess what - you get the penalty.
There's no use whining about it. If you don't like the rules to play nice with others then take your ball and play by yourself.
[looks around] notes missing steel industry, almost dead car industry, Detroit, electronics industry, retreating engineering industry, small widget manufacturing, semiconductor manufacture, computer manufacture, clothing manufacture... I'm really not sure that open trade has worked out that well, frankly. For that matter, in the intellectual areas where we maintained some presence for a little longer... not so much today. Companies think nothing of outsourcing anything they can, and countries like India are happy to fill those roles. Of course, we're still pushing paperwork around on Wall street and etc., and we have basic food commodities and some oil resources, but we're really not doing that well overall.
Within our borders, we have a large workforce, many of whom are unemployed, a large market, and immense natural resources, all within our borders. Economically speaking, it seems to me that a round of protectionism might not be a bad idea at all at this juncture.
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
If the reason you think someone's doing something is really, really stupid, maybe it's not actually the reason they're doing it. All the other people in the world are not morons.
No kidding!!! What do you say at this point?
Nothing comes close to Google maps.
And don't even bother mentioning Open street maps. Just don't.
Let's face it, the EU is looking for a money grab, trying to extort Google back to an unworkable privacy model with every service having its own rules and its own sign up. Yet this is not what EU citizens want. Those that do have already closed their Google accounts and exported all their data (something no other service even offers). All 6 users that couldn't abide by googles integrated sign on have left.
Everyone else likes it and uses it to their advantage. The EU is working against the wishes and against the interests of its citizens.
Sig Battery depleted. Reverting to safe mode.
In well functioning economies, "circulating money" is a sign of lots of useful economic activity. Such useful activity happens when companies make things people want.
But you're confused about cause and effect: you can't make an economy function well by forcing money to circulate. You and I can play ping pong with our wallets and circulate money between us all day long and nobody is going to benefit. If you tax that activity, the money will disappear entirely.
That's the reason why economists distinguish between transfers and actual spending. Transfers don't count in GDP and, indeed, do not represent production. You give money to someone: transfer. Government taxes your money and gives it to a benefits recipient person: transfer. But it's not true that you can't force money to circulate or that money somehow disappears when you tax it (where do you think it goes, exactly?). Government taxes and spends it on infrastructure: infrastructure spending is not a transfer and IS money being made to circulate. Government taxes well off people who save more and gives it to poorer people: a transfer, but money in the hands of poorer people tends to circulate more.
Because in Economics 101, we all learn that if we force goods (and hence money) to circulate within a country and to stop them from crossing borders, everybody is so much better off than if we let them engage in trade! Protectionism, yeah! It's worked so well!
Trade is good, in general, yes, with some downsides. But it's not money crossing borders that's so much the problem, except possibly within the Eurozone. Money doesn't cross borders that much, instead one currency is swapped for another. For an EU citizen to buy stuff from Google (or for Google to repatriate profits) he finds someone with dollars who wants to swap them for his own currency. Sometimes this person might be a central bank or US citizen wanting to leave them in a bank account. But most of the time this is someone wanting to buy something in the EU. Goods, promises (ie, loans), asset ownership and similar are exchanged across borders, but often not money. When a country gets problems with its trade balance that means that lots of goods are coming in but are being exchanged for asset ownership or loan claims going out (or vice versa for surplus countries). For that reason, a government borrowing heavily in a country with a low savings rate, as in the US, can cause problems for that country's exporters. And a government saving heavily in a country with a high savings rate, as in China, does the opposite. Both of these effects are seen in the exchange rate, of course.
Nothing comes close to Google maps.
HERE (including former Navteq!) has 80% market share in all car navigation systems. The map data is quite good, the routes calculated by here.com are also on par with Google (sometimes slightly better, at other times slightly words). Maybe Google has some more point of interest listed, but this is a matter of market share of the software as a guide rather than only routing. The more people use HERE map data and software as a guide, the more points of interest they will add.
Everyone else likes it and uses it to their advantage. The EU is working against the wishes and against the interests of its citizens.
Unfortunately most people do not understand the significance of privacy and free speech. Ask people if they'd sell the right to speak out on one tiny specific topic for 1000€ annually, and you will see that freedom has a price-tag. Nevertheless I think governments should prevent people from selling their privacy and freedom. (Yes, sounds illogical to force people to stay free. I'm still working on that one :-)
Trolling is a art!
Better in a way that people felt that they had a stable life with stable income, and were able to plan their lives tens of years ahead.
That's because in American it's every man for himself. You don't try to build a better society to live in, you build a gated community to keep everyone else out.
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
US corporatocratic government cannot be expected to be fiscally responsible. It's major mission is globalism to which end it engages in (very expensive) perpetual war. The EU have given up militaristic imperialism and saved vast amounts of treasure thereby.
US "leaders" are all utterly corrupt puppets of the rich who differentiate based on social issues come election time.
Americans hate taxes because they increase but we don't benefit from the increase. Since I will not obtain any good from increases I prefer to fight to limit taxes. Either way they'll be misused so "less is better".
The US isn't "doomed" but it can't become a better place so the best one may do is dodge as much government bullshit as practical.
"This post is an artistic work of fiction and falsehood. Only a fool would take anything posted here as fact."
Not quite. Companies are not people in Europe. They are "juridical persons", which is not the same thing.
Besides, EU companies regularily get fined. And quite heavily at that.
"It's such a fine line between stupid and clever" -- David St. Hubbins, Spinal Tap
Except the part where the EU has nothing waiting in the wings that comes anywhere near to the package Google offers.
Lets face it, Google cutting off the EU would bring the continent to its knees for months and months.
Yandex couldn't possibly scale fast enough, and the EU threatening Yandex with silly fines could see great segments of
the EU suddenly without enough gas to warm a teapot.
bing hasn't been tested yet as an option, and there's always duckduckgo. surely THAT search meets their privacy expectations!
Remove all the services, and only leave them search. See how the people of the EU like that.
Sounds like an awesome justification for the EU to start coercive licensing of Google's intellectual property. Coercive licensing is the process used by countries that have decided that a company has priced a drug too high, so they allow a competitor to make it instead.
They would write them a letter.
LOL! Simply LOL.
What is so vital about Google that can bring Europe to its knees? There are adequate (and in some instances superior) replacement to each Google service already reachable.
Oolite: Elite-like game. For Mac, Linux and Windows
The people of Europe wouldn't really care much. There are plenty of alternatives to Google's services, and Google would be handing their competitors the whole EU on a nice easy silver platter.
Oolite: Elite-like game. For Mac, Linux and Windows
Yes, but not any letter. It would for sure be a quite strongly worded one!!!111!1!
Trolling is a art!
Google are breaking the law. Pure and simple. Whatever you think of the law is a different matter.
I don't think fines will work for a variety of reasons, e.g. long trials and appeals processes while they negotiate the size of the settlement while the legal infringements continue unabated, and the eventual amount paid usually gets written off as a cost of doing business.
If the EU countries (and other regions, e.g. South America, and Africa) and their ISPs blocked or at least filtred Google (China and Saudi Arabia already do) and whoever else breaks the law (Our politicians seem to be happy with anti-piracy blocking), that'd get their undivided attention very quickly. Even if users circumvent the blocking using proxies or TOR, Google and other law breakers would still lose much of the surveillance data or it'd be rendered worthless. All the time that Google's infringing services are offline or unusable would provide opportunities for more ethical and legally compliant services to gain market share, e.g. for search there's IX Quick. It'd be nice to see more diversity and competition on the web instead of this massive, centralised domination by a small number of US companies. That would be even better for local economies.
On the espionage front, why should the USA be able to snoop on everyone else's web activities but nobody allowed to snoop on theirs? They have an unfair, unethical (and illegal) advantage in negotiating political, trade, aid, and business agreements. That's what the rest of the world are really up in arms about.
All the other people in the world are not morons.
I object. But do agree that "Not all the other people in the world are morons.", it's just I'm convinced as well that "Not all the other people in the world are not morons." Takes all kinds...
Trolling is a art!
Indeed. Which is - I admit - a shame. But we're also capable of learning from our errors, it seems:
Source
I wish the same could be said about Obama's administration and its stance towards the NSA spying.
Google cutting off the EU would free the EU, if only they could cut off the US too.
Speaking as an American and my experience with other Americans, most Americans are crazy. (well, so are most people around the world but...)
The issue of taxes really comes down to how much value do you get from the taxes. EU have higher rates overall, but at the same time there is a much more evident benefit from those taxes. Affordable/free health care, affordable/free education, retirement safety nets, and so forth. Yes I agree that sometimes these plans overreached and could not be paid for, but the point is that there is something in return for the taxes. In the US, the biggest expenditure is the military, and not all of that goes for staff (ie, as a jobs program it's overpriced), but that's not directly benefiting most people with their expenses and no one wants to touch their budget. The safety net is not so great overall, medical health insurance still only for older people and difficult to fund, and almost nothing whatsoever comes back for education. So it's money spent in taxes with nothing coming back the other way.
It's like Europeans are paying %40 of their income on a new luxury car with room for 6, and Americans are paying %20 of their income for a 30 year old Ford Pinto.
The crazy part is because no one wants to touch the military budgets, that the anger is focused on very minor things. An after-school program for at-risk youths is deemed a waste but a new billion dollar fighter plane is left alone and the contractors who are inflating the costs are never investigated. Eisenhower warns about the military-industrial complex and no one pays too much attention, Reagan warns about welfare queens and the voters rally to his side. A trillion dollars is so huge that I think some people just don't comprehend it, whereas a waste of a mere million dollars can be understood and so that is jumped on fast.
They're protecting their own economic interests.
As others have pointed out with links to back them up, the number of EU companies prosecuted under the same laws and the size of the fines applied, thoroughly debunks that assertion. The US is in Rome, try observing some facts about their way of life before assuming you know what they think.
If only there were some historical document [the] illustrating how [declaration] often that [of] happens we [independence] could look at.
You took colonised land away from a British king with the help of the French, not so impressive compared to William the Conquer who took England away from an English King.
And did you exchange a walk on part in the war for a lead role in a cage? - Pink Floyd.
Yeah, if you were a straight white middle aged male with a decent education, lucky enough to land a boring corporate managerial job, you found a wife that actually would stick with you for tens of years, and nothing else happened, then you could look forward to decades of boring, mindless stability in a system that was was cheating you in many ways, living in a cheap house and spending your time watching TV and maybe playing golf. In the end, you'd still get cheated on your pension. If you were a single female, gay, or minority, you couldn't be part of that system if you wanted to.
But do you really want to work in the same job for the next 30 years, having your income keep up barely with inflation, seeing the biggest losers at your company get the same raises as you, and then retire on a pittance that the company assigns to you? That's what you're asking for, and that's what many Europeans get, the lucky ones that is.
Economists do lots of things, some of them even sensible. TheRaven64, however, didn't.
When people "save" money, what they are actually doing is investing it in businesses. Those businesses use that money to buy equipment in order to do something productive with it. When government takes that money instead and gives it to people who will use it for consumption, the consumer goods they buy with it won't be used to produce anything new. So your idea that taxing and then transferring the money to poor people is good for the economy is wrong.
Did anybody say it was? Why are you putting up straw men?
Well, gee, you just wanted to tax people who save, thereby discouraging from saving. Now that causes problems for the country's exporters. Can't make up your mind?
When people "save" money, what they are actually doing is investing it in businesses. Those businesses use that money to buy equipment in order to do something productive with it. When government takes that money instead and gives it to people who will use it for consumption, the consumer goods they buy with it won't be used to produce anything new. So your idea that taxing and then transferring the money to poor people is good for the economy is wrong.
When people save money they can be doing quite a lot of things. They may be buying assets, like shares or houses, which is a transfer and doesn't represent any economic activity (except for commissions, etc). Or they may be saving it in a bank account. In a bank account most of the money will be lent out again, although much of it will be to governments and consumers as loans, not businesses, and in the process more money will be created and spent. Whilst this is true, it doesn't help.
Let's take a very simplified example situation. Suppose that everyone who borrows immediately spends the money, and that everyone they spend it with simply saves it in a bank account. And suppose that banks must keep 10% of their deposits as reserves, that $100 is created and put in a bank and that no-one keeps any cash. If you know the money multiplier you'll know what happens: We start with $100 in existence. $90 is lent to someone else, who spends it and it becomes $90 of new bank deposits. $81 is lent to someone, who spends it and it becomes $81 of bank deposits. Etc. We end up with $1000 of bank deposits and no new movements of money. Economic activity ceases because no new money can be lent (the bank is right up to its reserve requirement) and everyone is sitting on their savings.
Back in the real-ish world, suppose that 10% of all the money is cash and the rest in deposits. The amount lent by banks depends on the size of their deposits (and loans from central banks, etc), and on things like their reserve ratios, capital requirements and so on. If you receive your salary as a bank deposit it doesn't matter whether you spend it (thus putting it in someone else's account) or save it, as long as you don't draw more out as cash than you'd normally have and put it under the mattress it the amount of deposits available to banks to lend stays the same. In other words, your saving does not increase the amount available for banks to lend to businesses. Only the 10% of money as cash changes - lets say everyone keeps half as much cash around - will your decisions make any difference.
What matters is how often this money, including bank deposits, changes hands. Saving it means reducing that frequency - that's what saving is, the moving of your right to spend it from one time to another. That's why taxing it and spending it, or taxing it and giving it to people who spend it, can increase economic activity.
Did anybody say it was? Why are you putting up straw men?
Yes, TheRaven64 did.
Well, gee, you just wanted to tax people who save, thereby discouraging from saving. Now that causes problems for the country's exporters. Can't make up your mind?
I didn't just say I wanted to tax people who save. I didn't say anything at all about what I wanted to do. In fact, I think that the right response to the recession (beyond increasing the money supply, which is obvious) is extremely difficult to know precisely because of the tension between these two problems. However, one thing should be obvious: sooner or later the US is going to have to get over its allergy to tax and, at the very least, start taxing income from capital and to wealthy people at least as much as it taxes everyone else. And it needs to use that to reduce its deficit.
That's one hell of a twisted version of it.
Considering that about the only problem I did see was the discrimination against certain people, and everything else you mention is pretty much imaginary or not a problem, I would take it over not getting a job, or getting fired over getting sick, or because company wants to hire someone from China to do your job, or just not being liked by the boss any day, yes.
And mind you, single people didn't get discriminated against. They got fast tracked since they could travel freely and could do the job that required quick response (i.e. moving when necessary).
As for getting cheated on pensions, you are utterly clueless. My generation, we will get cheated on pensions due to current situation with population and the fact that there won't be anyone to pay for mine. The generation currently on pension on the other hand is living off their pensions in Thailand and Spain like kings.
But hey, if you want to think that if you're talented, you're somehow better off today than you were a few decades ago, keep on living that dream. Reality is, nepotism is much stronger today and advancing purely on talent was much easier a few decades ago, unless you are absolutely exceptional.
Shares are the primary economic activity: they represent investments in companies and produce both economic activity plus the generation of additional wealth. Banks lend privately, they invest, and they lend to the government. Of those, lending to the government generally results in pure consumption, the other two are basically like investments and generate wealth.
What allergy to taxes? The US already has some of the highest overall capital gains taxes in the world, and even its nominal capital gains tax is higher than the OECD average. Likewise, the top marginal income tax rates in the US are some of the highest in the world, nearly as high as Sweden. Furthermore, if you tried to increase those taxes, people would simply avoid them, legally.
The reason the US has a deficit is not because we don't tax enough, it's because we spend too much, on tons of useless and ineffective federal programs.
Certain people, like everybody who wasn't a straight white male working a corporate job. Which meant that life wasn't so good for a huge number of Americans.
Everybody is a lot better off today than they would have been in the 1960's.
1. I'm not an American.
2. That is called "technological progress". Issue is, that in spite of it massively pushing forward even today, quality of life is actually going down.
That suggests we have hit the saturation point where parasitic corporatism is so powerful, that even technological progress can no longer hide its inefficiency.
I've lived through it as an adult for several decades, I assure you: quality of life has improved immensely in the US and even much of Europe.
If by "parasitic corporatism" you mean the fact that governments increasingly shove vast amounts of public funds in the direction of well connected big corporations, you're absolutely right: it's a huge problem. But the guilty parties there are the politicians that waste our money in that way, because they are supposed to spend our taxes wisely. The corporations just take whatever governments are willing to hand out, no different from you or I.
The solution to these corrupt government is not to get rid of the corporations and handing even more power to governments, it is the exact opposite: take away power from governments. And that's not theory, you simply have to look at how well or poorly different countries in North America and Europe have been doing and what policies they adopted. The economic disasters in Greece and Spain were caused by their governments, not corporations or banks or any other of the groups the left likes to blame.
If you seriously think that economic disasters in Greece and Spain were caused by their governments and banks have no parts in it, I only have one question for you.
What are the base principles behind that device that allows creation of tunnel that lets you post on slashdot from a different universe and how can I build one?
Greece had a government debt crisis:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G...
That means the Greek government borrowed more than it could afford, in large part because they bet on continued growth that didn't materialize. Then they lied about their financial situation, so people kept giving them money long past where it was reasonable. And because they had foolishly joined the Euro they couldn't get out of this the way they used to. In what way are banks responsible for any of this?
And make no mistake: the economic meltdown in Greece can happen in any European country: France, Germany, you name it. It could also happen in the US, although for various reasons, the US can get away with a bit more.
I'm am... astounded by the sheer ignorance before me.
Truly, I do not think I can argue against this. To do so would require me typing out pages of material because the sheer depth of ignorance requires going to the basics of our financial system.
I'm not astounded by your ignorance. In fact, it's a reflection of the crap you read that you erroneously think describes "the basics of our financial system".
The only thing the Greek government debt crisis has to do with "our" financial system is that banks and other financial institutions are being pressured and subsidized by European governments to waste even more money on Greece because everybody wants to pretend that Greece isn't actually a basked case.
But the causes of the Greek government debt crisis are quite simply that the Greek government borrowed too much and lied about their economic performance, nothing else. It's no different from when you get in trouble if you max out your credit cards and then fraudulently apply for more and max those out too. Of course, people like you manage to blame the banks for that too.
So, can you tell us about that machine that lets you send messages across parallel worlds? It's much more interesting than the strange retelling of history from our world's stand point that you're engaging in.
Why don't you tell us how the Greek government borrowing too much money is the fault of banks.
But, of course, you exhaust yourself in this nonsense because you don't know. You don't know because you're full of sh*t.