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August 25, 2009
Fact of the day
How was it that the Swiss came to have secrecy laws?
In 1934, Swiss politicians were legislating in response to specific events abroad: a Nazi law that made it a death-penalty crime to hold assets outside the country; a scandal stoked by French socialist politicians over Swiss bank accounts held by prominent citizens. The Swiss looked out and saw a world gone mad: bank failures, depression, militarism, fascism, communism. The new law was meant to buttress the world's confidence in the privacy and security of a Swiss bank account.Does the World Still Need the Swiss? By Holman Jenkins
One of our potential futures is one in which populism runs amok and massive wealth expropriation takes place. If that day comes to pass I hope there are still countries like Switzerland.
Posted by OneEyedMan at August 25, 2009 10:45 PM
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