The Finance Curse

How global finance is making us all poorer

Author: Nicholas Shaxson

An agenda-setting, campaigning book that shows how global finance is a system that works for the few and not the many - and how we can dismantle it.

Global finance is a system that works for the few and against the many.

We need finance - but when finance grows too big it becomes a curse. We are told global finance is about wealth creation; Now he tells the explosive story of how finance established a stranglehold on society and points us towards a way out.

Product Unavailable

PRODUCT INFORMATION

Summary

An agenda-setting, campaigning book that shows how global finance is a system that works for the few and not the many - and how we can dismantle it.

Global finance is a system that works for the few and against the many.

Description

Global finance is a system that works for the few and against the many.

We need finance - but when finance grows too big it becomes a curse. The City of London is the single biggest drain on our resources; it sucks talent out of every sphere, it siphons wealth and hoovers up government time. Yet to be 'competitive', we're told we must turn a blind eye to money-laundering and appease big business with tax cuts. We are told global finance is about wealth creation; the reality is wealth extraction.

Tracing the curse back through economic history, Shaxson uncovers how we got to this point. He exposes offshore tax havens; the uncontrolled growth of monopolies; the myths around the Celtic Tiger and its low corporate tax rate; the bizarre industry of wealth management; the destructive horrors of private equity; and the sinister 'Competitiveness Agenda'.

Nicholas Shaxson revealed the dark heart of tax havens long before the Panama and Paradise Papers. Now he tells the explosive story of how finance established a stranglehold on society and points us towards a way out.

This is a book that none of us can afford to ignore.

Critic Reviews

Searing... Shaxson has form on being prescient ... his ideas should not be dismissed lightly -- Caroline Binham Financial Times Gripping . . . a superbly written overview Times Literary Supplement This superbly written book shows definitively how global finance has been grossly mis-sold to us all. It's a must-read for anyone who lives, works and spends in this country -- MISHA GLENNY, author of McMafia This is a splendid polemic against modern finance, in general, and the City of London, in particular. It is hard-hitting, well written and informative. Instead of enabling productive investment, the predominant activity of contemporary finance is rent extraction. This comes in many different guises: modern finance does not only promote tax avoidance and evasion, but, argues Shaxson, enables gangsterism and corruption on an enormous scale. I fear he is right. -- Martin Wolf Financial Times Utterly convincing... The Finance Curse is a radical and important manifesto for improving Britain -- Oliver Bullough, author of MONEYLAND

About the Author

Nicholas Shaxson is the author of Treasure Islands- Tax Havens and the Men who Stole the World and Poisoned Wells- the Dirty Politics of African Oil. He is a journalist, a campaigner and world expert on both tax havens and financial centres; and on the Resource Curse. His writing has appeared in Vanity Fair, Financial Times, The Economist, The Economist Intelligence Unit, and many others. He is part of the organisation the Tax Justice Network.