ECB offers to 'help' rethink EU plans on Financial Transactio Tax
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- Written by Ralph Atkins
- Category: News
The European Central Bank has offered to help the EU redesign its financial transactions tax to avoid any ‘negative impact’ on market stability, highlighting official fears about the implementation of the levy.
Read more: ECB offers to 'help' rethink EU plans on Financial Transactio Tax
UN rapporteurs call for human rights in post 2015 agenda
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- Written by UN
- Category: Documents
17 special rapporteurs of the UN Human Rights Council call for a focus on human rights, equality and social protection in the post 2015 development agenda.
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Developing World to Dominate Global Investment by 2030
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- Written by Carey L. Biron/IPS
- Category: Analysis
Over the next decade and a half, a major global shift will result in the developing world controlling roughly half of the world's capital, up from less than a third today.
According to new scenarios released Thursday by the World Bank, developing countries could control some 158 trillion dollars (at 2010 rates) by 2030, particularly in East Asia and Latin America. By that time, the developing world could account for 87 to 93 percent of global growth.
Read more: Developing World to Dominate Global Investment by 2030
A new perspective on the problem of hunger
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- Written by Ann Hollingshead
- Category: Analysis
The solutions to problems are often implicit in the way they are framed. If I tell you my car won’t start, you might tell me to consult a mechanic. If, on the other hand, I tell you I can’t find my keys, well, we have a completely different problem. In public policy, frames can often conflate symptoms with causes, other times, such as with the example I gave, they just obscure a possible solution.
But frames turn out to be fundamentally important to the problems’ solutions. As Albert Einstein once said, “If I had an hour to solve a problem and my life depended on the solution, I would spend the first fifty-five minutes determining the proper question to ask, for once I know the proper question, I could solve the problem in less than five minutes.”
Faulted World Bank data on Poverty
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- Written by Jomo Kwame Sundram
- Category: Analysis
In early 2012, outgoing World Bank President Robert Zoellick announced that the Millennium Development Goal of halving the global poverty rate relative to its 1990 level had been achieved in 2010 – five years ahead of schedule.
However, many analysts have challenged estimates that rely on the World Bank’s current poverty line, raised in 2008 from $1 to $1.25 per day, in purchasing power parity (PPP) terms.
Open letter to EU president on tax matters
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- Written by civil society coalition
- Category: News
Dear Mr Van Rompuy,
As a broad coalition working on tax justice and the fight against tax evasion and tax avoidance both in developed and developing countries, we are pleased to hear that you have put this subject on the agenda of the next EU leaders Summit on 22nd of May.
We urge EU leaders to take this opportunity to agree on concrete measures including multilateral automatic information exchange; disclosure of beneficial owners through public registries; combined and country-by-country reporting for transnational corporations in all sectors; and a common binding definition of tax havens and effective non-compliance sanctions.
Tax evasion: Shameless obstructionism on banking transparency must be overcome
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- Written by Sven Giegold
- Category: Analysis
EU finance ministers failed once again to agree on ending loopholes in the EU savings directive, under which Luxembourg and Austria are exempted from provisions on automatic information exchange, due to continued opposition from those two countries. The Greens hit out at the continued obstruction by Luxembourg and Austria to this key measure aimed at ensuring banking transparency, with a view to tackling tax avoidance.
Read more: Tax evasion: Shameless obstructionism on banking transparency must be overcome
Impact of the financial and economic crisis on human rights
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- Written by European Parliament
- Category: Documents
On 18 April of 2013, the European Parliament adopted an initiative report on the impact of financial and economic crisis on human rights. The resolution is very interesting, focusing on the right to social security and other social and economic rights, support for a global financial transaction tax, welcoming the proposal for a global fund for social protection ...
Global Employment Trends for Youth 2013
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- Written by ILO
- Category: Documents
In six out of ten examined countries over 60 % of young people are either unemployed, working in low quality, irregular, low wage jobs, often in the informal sector ...
Kofi Annan: Imagine An African Continent, Where Leaders Use Mineral Wealth Wisely
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- Written by EJ Fagan / GFI
- Category: Analysis
“Imagine an African continent, where leaders use mineral wealth wisely to fund better health, education, energy, and infrastructure too. Africa, our continent has oil, gas, platinum, diamonds, cobalt, copper, and more. If we use these resources wisely, they will improve the lives of millions of Africans. If we don’t, they can fuel corruption, conflict, and social instability. Transparency and accountability are key. The US and Europe are demanding new transparency from companies who work in Africa. We must also take responsibility. Our governments may have become more open. Big businesses may have improved their ways of working.
But we — Africans –must do so much more. This issue is too big for the politicians and big business to manage without the involvement of civil society. I’m Kofi Annan, former Secretary-General of the United Nations and Chair of the Africa Progress Panel. Work with me to demand more transparency from Africa’s national leaders and foreign investors. What are they doing? How much is it worth? And how will the money be spent? Because this is our continent, our minerals, our children’s and grandchildren’s future.”
The World Bank and its new Poverty Approach
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- Written by Francine Mestrum
- Category: Research
The World Bank and its ‘new’ Poverty Approach
Francine Mestrum*
‘We should strive to eradicate absolute poverty by the end of this century’ said World Bank President Robert McNamara in 1973 at the annual meeting of the Bretton Woods Institutions. As we know, at the end of the century, the World Bank and the IMF introduced their ‘Poverty Reduction Strategy Papers’ and at the UN General Assembly it was decided to halve extreme poverty by 2015, compared to 1990. To-day, World Bank President Jim Yong Kim proposes to ‘end extreme poverty by 2030’.[i]
