For Immediate Release
Thursday, June 28, 2001

OECD Forced to Make Major Concessions,
But New Agreement Still Dangerously Flawed

The Center for Freedom and Prosperity released the following statements from Andrew Quinlan, president of the Center for Freedom and Prosperity and Dan Mitchell, senior fellow at the Heritage Foundation:

ANDREW QUINLAN:

"Thanks to U.S. leadership, the OECD has been forced to retreat. Deadlines have been pushed back. Threats of financial protectionism have been reduced. Indeed, the Paris-based bureaucracy has thrown in the towel on its tax harmonization agenda. Equally important, they have been forced to scale back their "information exchange" assault on financial privacy. That's the good news.

"The bad news is that the OECD is still demanding that other countries have an obligation to help enforce the oppressive tax laws of OECD member nations.

"The Center will be increasing its public education campaign in the coming months. Given all the developments in recent days, we will repel the OECD's fiscal imperialism. In the last 10 days alone, for instance, House Majority Whip Tom DeLay and two top House Committee chairmen, Rep. David Dreier of California and John Boehner of Ohio, have come out against the OECD's dangerous information exchange agenda.  Leading grassroots groups like the Free Congress Foundation, Americans for Tax Reform and Citizens for a Sound Economy also have weighed in against the OECD's anti-privacy initiative.

"Tax competition, financial privacy and fiscal sovereignty should be celebrated, not persecuted."

DAN MITCHELL:

"The President's economic team thwarted the worst aspects of the OECD's anti-tax competition campaign, but the agreement still contains dangerous elements.  Information exchange for tax purposes, even when limited to specific cases, is inconsistent with sound tax policy, respect for privacy, and international comity."

For additional comments:

Andrew Quinlan can be reached at 202-285-0244.

Dan Mitchell can be reached at 202-608-6224

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