In case you have missed it, the Federal Government is waging a war on CASH! This war has been on-going for some time, but, it seems to be intensifying of late.
As part of the "War on Drugs" banks have been required to file a report with the Justice Department anytime more than $10,000 cash is withdrawn or deposited. Auto dealers have to report cash purchases of cars and title companies have to report cash transactions greater than $10,000 for real estate. This effort has been an abject failure. Link
Due to recent events in Greece and other European countries, capital controls, in the form of restrictions on cash withdrawals from banks have been imposed in many European countries. In the U.S., banks have been told to scrutinize cash transactions greater than $5,000 and report if deemed suspicious.
There are four principal reasons why governments want to eliminate cash from the economy.
1. People would not be able to evade paying taxes if all transactions are electronic.
2. The Federal Reserve and banks would be able to impose negative interest rates on depositors (depositors pay interest to banks on their deposits), since the depositors could not withdraw their funds and hold cash.
3. The Government would be able to shut down all illegal activities that are currently conducted using cash.
4. A fourth advantage of the elimination of physical cash would be to more easily control people and potential dissidents through the freezing of their bank accounts.
The bottom line is that citizens lose privacy and freedom while the Government increases its control over the populace. An in-depth description of actions taken so far and the potential ramifications are detailed in a two part article by Dan Mitchell senior fellow at the Cato Institute. Link
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