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

theguardian.com

61–70 of 197 posts

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

#61

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

They systemically lock people out of banking, home ownership, employment, running a business, selling their products, getting famous, and so-on.

There's a class of people that has to have "more" than the rest. And they do that by controlling access to everything. They spend tons of money on distractions and concepts like moneylending which makes everyone have to go through the "loan" and "approval" process - of course only some people get approved lol So nobody else gets a house!

Instead of trying to become better themselves and make new discoveries, and build genuine wealth they can give back, the gatekeeping/inheritance mindset is to stop others who are trying to better themselves. To knock them back. It doesn't stop at preventing others from attaining wealth and status, they don't even want you to have a roof over your head.

If they had it their way, you wouldn't have a bank, house, car, and barely any money. You'd be wearing some goofy uniform working for them living in poverty.

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

#62
post #7

The amount of nickel-and-diming and outright being screwed over at local businesses I've experienced in my lifetime vastly eclipses generous return policies and treatment by megacorporations.

Let’s keep in mind that US corporations just received literal billions in tariff refunds, effectively stealing money from everyone who bought anything in the last year.

But i’m sure being charged an extra dollar at a small store that’s barely getting by (assuming this is true) is the real problem..

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

#63
post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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…

Obvious solution is to make soft drugs like fentanyl fully legal. Just apply sufficient purity to standards as regulation like with any other drug. Issue solved instantly. It is not like other deathly drugs aren't already legal.

Obvious solution is to make soft drugs like fentanyl fully legal. Just apply sufficient purity to standards as regulation like with any other drug. Issue solved instantly. It is not like other deathly drugs aren't already legal. [emphasis mine]

sarcasm or typo?

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

#64
post #55
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…

If we want to stop illegal immigration, "not getting a car loan" and "harder to move money across the border" feel like the most humane ways to slow it down. Plus, the drug trade coming in from Mexico is, in fact, a huge problem, not just for the US, but for Mexico itself. Mexico is run by cartels specifically because of how much money is made off selling drugs to Americans. This isn't some non-existent problem they…

> If we want to stop illegal immigration, "not getting a car loan" and "harder to move money across the border" feel like the most humane ways to slow it down.

I can think of a more humane way: Prosecuting the employers who break the law by hiring undocumented workers. The prospect of employment is what draws migrants here in the first place.

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

#65
post #56

It surprises me how much Americans don't understand how deeply the cartel is in every transaction. Yes, sending money to Grandma to pay for a car is funding the cartel who probably got paid to make the car available. Grandma may even pay small direct bribes to the cartel just to be able to live her life. Either all of Mexico can move to the US (probably not a winning solution) or we can make Mexico a safe and excelle…

A safe and prosperous Mexico would be a huge advantage to America. We should be investing a lot more into this.

The US has been investing heavily in Mexico. They are our top trading partner.

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

#67
post #50
post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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 gro…

This is 100% true and also a tactic used by PNC when I was a near zero person. The hack around it was to try to withdraw cash, then use that. They wouldn't let you overdraft cash withdrawal. That's one anecdotal likely stale trick to avoid the traps they set.

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

#68
post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Obvious solution is to make soft drugs like fentanyl fully legal. Just apply sufficient purity to standards as regulation like with any other drug. Issue solved instantly. It is not like other deathly drugs aren't already legal.

Obvious solution is to make soft drugs like fentanyl fully legal. Just apply sufficient purity to standards as regulation like with any other drug. Issue solved instantly. It is not like other deathly drugs aren't already legal. [emphasis mine] sarcasm or typo?

Just pointing out the double standards and the main funding source being due to illegality. And we all known how many people die due to ethanol each year. But because it is drug of the choice by too many totalitarian fascists it won't get banned like other drugs do.

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

#70
post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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 gro…

This is 100% true and also a tactic used by PNC when I was a near zero person. The hack around it was to try to withdraw cash, then use that. They wouldn't let you overdraft cash withdrawal. That's one anecdotal likely stale trick to avoid the traps they set.

The problem is then you have the card number sitting in some online card wallet, set for Autopay or something, and suddenly it's just... allowed to charge you next month even though the card's got nothing.

Hell no, that shit should have bounced. Now you're in the hole $80 because your phone payment took an autopay from your Visa number.

Blindly allowing recurring auths to bypass the overdraft rules is utterly insane. Whoops, let's just autobill a few extra zeros!

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