Cyprus and its prospective international lenders are considering altering brackets on a one-off deposit levy agreed to as part of a bailout deal reached Saturday that will see savers suffer losses in exchange for the country’s EUR10 billion bailout, an official with knowledge of the situation said Sunday.
The plan that is currently under consideration will leave the target revenue of the extraordinary levy unchanged at EUR5.8B but will seek to protect smaller depositors.
According to the official a new plan would see deposits up to EUR100,000 taking a loss of under 5%; of EUR100,000 to EUR500,000 under 10%; and over EUR500,000 of about 13%.
Well, all governments take a cut of their citizens' wealth, right? That's what taxation is. So what's the big deal if they take some out of your bank account instead of just tapping into your income stream? Because once it survives the first round of government taking and lands in your savings or checking account, money becomes more like real property. If that's not off-limits, heaven help us in our quest for a modicum of freedom and liberty.
(via Hot Air, which notes, sensibly, that if this precedent is set, all Europeans should be asking if they are next.)
And, hell, I don't know that I won' take out some of my money and start keeping it under the mattress. Presidential spokesman Jay Carney on the Cyprus situation:
“We are monitoring this closely, as you would imagine, but that our overall approach has been to support a strong, stable Europe, because it's in the interests not just of Europe, but in the United States,” Carney said Monday.
Double yikes! No support for private property from this administration. What a shock.
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If you think it won't happen here, you are fooling yourself...you already gave the feds carte blanche to your assets with ObumbleCare...