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The US tried to stop cartel money-laundering; devastated mom-and-pop businesses

theguardian.com

41–50 of 193 posts

Re: The US tried to stop cartel money-laundering; devastated mom-and-pop businesses

#41

Money laundering is an absurd concept. People should be free to transfer money to whoever they like, without permission. It is a fundamental purpose of money. To deny this purpose puts the validity of particular money into question. Putting up fences results in a very high rate of false positives. No wonder people use crypto as they should. If you want to go after cartels, then actually go after cartels. That's not w…

> Money laundering is an absurd concept. People should be free to transfer money to whoever they like, without permission.

This ignores that taxes are a thing that need enforcement. Its like saying basic necessities should be free, the world should be without pollution, or cancer shouldn't exist.

Re: The US tried to stop cartel money-laundering; devastated mom-and-pop businesses

#42
post #36

He's also making it difficult/impossible for people without work visas to obtain auto loans which is destroying the used car market in latino communities and cities with large latino populations. Executive Order 14406 defends this with, > Low-dollar cross-border funds transfers have been used to facilitate or commit terrorist financing, narcotics trafficking, human trafficking, and other illegal activity. They're ban…

>He's also making it difficult/impossible for people without work visas to obtain auto loans [...] >They're banging the national security drum to make it unlivable here for some. But they're not supposed to be here in the first place? As for the people who are supposed to be here, but are collateral damage (ie. "which is destroying the used car market in latino communities") should we have sympathy for people in such…

Everything else aside,

> "people without work visas"

is not the same legal category as

> "they're not supposed to be here"

Re: The US tried to stop cartel money-laundering; devastated mom-and-pop businesses

#43

He's also making it difficult/impossible for people without work visas to obtain auto loans which is destroying the used car market in latino communities and cities with large latino populations. Executive Order 14406 defends this with, > Low-dollar cross-border funds transfers have been used to facilitate or commit terrorist financing, narcotics trafficking, human trafficking, and other illegal activity. They're ban…

Is it creating the manual of the dystopia planner to list the excuses for totalitarism? "National security", "Personal security", "The safety of your kids", "the children"...

Or is it prodromic to a "stop talking to guts and let us put the factors in a computational framework, where all targets and constraints and consequences are laid out with their demographics"? A Cost/Risk/Benefit for policies?

Re: The US tried to stop cartel money-laundering; devastated mom-and-pop businesses

#44

He's also making it difficult/impossible for people without work visas to obtain auto loans which is destroying the used car market in latino communities and cities with large latino populations. Executive Order 14406 defends this with, > Low-dollar cross-border funds transfers have been used to facilitate or commit terrorist financing, narcotics trafficking, human trafficking, and other illegal activity. They're ban…

Why don't they have work visas?

Re: The US tried to stop cartel money-laundering; devastated mom-and-pop businesses

#45

My question is , why don't these people have bank accounts?

Depends. Why can't banks offer more debit cards to more people and, I don't know, stop honoring overdrafts? Transactions should decline, not overdraft, even with overdraft off.

We've built lots of traps for people that have balances near-zero that keep them near zero, and one little mistake snowballs into blacklists from Telecheck, ChexSystems, and other fun companies.

Meanwhile once you can keep your balance with at least three significant zeros in it, the bank will be happy to shower you back in rewards and cashback, ripped away from the fees and interest levied to the poor.

Re: The US tried to stop cartel money-laundering; devastated mom-and-pop businesses

#46

Money laundering is an absurd concept. People should be free to transfer money to whoever they like, without permission. It is a fundamental purpose of money. To deny this purpose puts the validity of particular money into question. Putting up fences results in a very high rate of false positives. No wonder people use crypto as they should. If you want to go after cartels, then actually go after cartels. That's not w…

> Money laundering is an absurd concept. People should be free to transfer money to whoever they like, without permission.

They got Al Capone for tax evasion, not any of the other obviously illegal stuff he was doing. I don't know the details, but I imagine it was because he put in effort to create an organization that made it difficult-to-impossible for the law-abiding feds to go after him directly. That's why it's important to also prohibit the ancillary activities of crime.

And money laundering isn't an absurd concept, it just means it's additionally illegal to conceal the origin of illicit income.

If you want to get all dogmatic against stuff like laws against money laundering, come up with an effective alternative. Otherwise those laws aren't going anywhere and few will care about your objections, because they're unreasonable.

Re: The US tried to stop cartel money-laundering; devastated mom-and-pop businesses

#47
post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>He's also making it difficult/impossible for people without work visas to obtain auto loans [...] >They're banging the national security drum to make it unlivable here for some. But they're not supposed to be here in the first place? As for the people who are supposed to be here, but are collateral damage (ie. "which is destroying the used car market in latino communities") should we have sympathy for people in such…

Everything else aside, > "people without work visas" is not the same legal category as > "they're not supposed to be here"

People with tourist visas I expect fully entitled and able to get car loans... (Edit: maybe I am misunderstanding the whole thing: is it "loaning cars" or is it "loaning the money to buy cars"?)

Re: The US tried to stop cartel money-laundering; devastated mom-and-pop businesses

#48
post #36

He's also making it difficult/impossible for people without work visas to obtain auto loans which is destroying the used car market in latino communities and cities with large latino populations. Executive Order 14406 defends this with, > Low-dollar cross-border funds transfers have been used to facilitate or commit terrorist financing, narcotics trafficking, human trafficking, and other illegal activity. They're ban…

>He's also making it difficult/impossible for people without work visas to obtain auto loans [...] >They're banging the national security drum to make it unlivable here for some. But they're not supposed to be here in the first place? As for the people who are supposed to be here, but are collateral damage (ie. "which is destroying the used car market in latino communities") should we have sympathy for people in such…

Whether or not they're "supposed" to be here, they've been an integral part of the US economy for decades. It's cutting off your nose to spite your face.

Re: The US tried to stop cartel money-laundering; devastated mom-and-pop businesses

#49
post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>He's also making it difficult/impossible for people without work visas to obtain auto loans [...] >They're banging the national security drum to make it unlivable here for some. But they're not supposed to be here in the first place? As for the people who are supposed to be here, but are collateral damage (ie. "which is destroying the used car market in latino communities") should we have sympathy for people in such…

Everything else aside, > "people without work visas" is not the same legal category as > "they're not supposed to be here"

1. So you'd agree that AI datecenter with 100 (or whatever) jet turbines merely "lacks a permit" rather than "not supposed to be there"?

2. Practically speaking, how many people lack a work visa (or similar documentation), but are supposed to be here?

Re: The US tried to stop cartel money-laundering; devastated mom-and-pop businesses

#50
post #45

My question is , why don't these people have bank accounts?

Depends. Why can't banks offer more debit cards to more people and, I don't know, stop honoring overdrafts? Transactions should decline, not overdraft, even with overdraft off . We've built lots of traps for people that have balances near-zero that keep them near zero, and one little mistake snowballs into blacklists from Telecheck, ChexSystems, and other fun companies. Meanwhile once you can keep your balance with a…

Bank of America had a class action against them because they would reorder transactions to make you overdraft.

For example, when I was relatively poor and near 0 balance in like 2009 era I’d wait for my direct deposit to come so I could grocery shop and pay bills.

When it deposited, the funds would become available to use even though the transaction wasn’t cleared, pretty normal so far.

So say you pay 2 bills and grocery shop, come back on Monday and you’d see that your pending deposit vanished, 3 transactions cleared for 3 overdrafts, then your deposit cleared afterward.

This is just one that I know about because it happened to me. I wonder how many less blatant scams like this exist that most people aren’t even aware of.

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