The enormous decline in oil prices have made many headlines over the past year. The Dutch central bank (DNB) argues that lower oil prices are a ‘tax cut’ for businesses and good for economic growth. But is this true? In this article, I will look at the entire shale oil industry and show why the Dutch central bank's assumptions are wrong. When the next recession hits, we will be talking about subprime oil-loans, instead of subprime mortgages. The American shale oil crisis will take the

Once upon a time there was a liberal vision for Europe. A free trade zone, with free movement of goods, services, people and capital, a single currency (fixed exchange rates), and fiscal competition between jurisdictions. Besides public pressure to limit the free movement of people within the European Union because of the immigration crisis, a trend has been developing over the past few years toward ‘uniform’ corporate tax rates. Taxes have to be equal across the European Union. A big

It may have escaped your attention, but the Dutch have had their ‘Money Week’ last week.

During this annually recurring initiative of the Dutch government, ‘activities are organized in order to teach children on primary schools how to deal with money. A lot of those activities take place in the classroom, where financial professionals will, on request, provide free lessons and workshops. Among others, employees from banks, insurance companies and the municipal credit banks, will teach the children how to deal with money in a fun way’ (excerpt from the associated site).