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I'm currently living in Tunisia, which does not allow currency to leave the country in any meaningful way. You can change a maximum of 10,000 TD at a time, equi

I'm currently living in Tunisia, which does not allow currency to leave the country in any meaningful way. You can change a maximum of 10,000 TD at a time, equivalent to ~$5,000 USD, and if you did it many times, they'd probably stop letting you do so. As the Tunisian economy reels from the crash of the tourism industry due to terrorism, all of the new startups are starting to cater to entrenched upper middle class Tunisians who's family money is stuck here. The policy kind of enforces saving money, and buys a bit of time for the economy if things go awry. It also creates a lot of animosity for the Tunisians who'd much rather have Euros to invest properly. Economic policy is fascinating stuff. Any other fun stories out there?

azernik 11y ago
In Israel, Rabin was actually Prime Minister twice; the first time was in the 1970s, when similar currency controls were in effect, including a ban on Israelis holding foreign bank accounts. He resigned after a journalist caught his wife withdrawing from an (illegal) US dollar account in Washington, DC.
- danielbln 11y ago
  "Do as I say, not as I do" seems to be the prevelant credo among politicians.
  - draw_down 11y ago
    Strike that- humans.
  - azernik 11y ago
    Well, he had the grace to accept responsibility and resign, even though it seems to have been purely his wife's initiative, so in the end the affair only increased the Israeli public's faith in his integrity.
pjc50 11y ago
The UK had capital controls until the 1970s. I see the GBP far up there on the opposite side of the chart; presumably that represents all the money rushing into the property bubble. I'm coming round to the belief that the big downside of free movement of goods/people/capital is the possibility of "sloshing": rapid change that capsizes the economy. Entire areas can dry up or become booms overnight. And because there isn't and can't be free movement of real estate to compensate, we get craziness in the property market.
- keithpeter 11y ago
  How much damping is needed to stop the sloshing but still allow 'organic' free trade, the kind of free trade that lets industries build up but without the short term bubbles? An aside UK property at the low end: the move from HA/Council rents to private rents (i.e. from around 350 to 750 per month outside the Great Wen) is going to make the current debate about livable wage interesting. Some Tories already coming round to rent cap/build for controlled rent.
- osullivj 11y ago
  Yes - the abolition of exchange controls was one of the first things Margaret Thatcher did when she became PM in May 1979.
- leohutson 11y ago
  Excess isolationism also makes the economy more vulnerable. For example, primary industries are more exposed by gluts in production flooding the market and driving down the value of goods, and shortages of domestically produced goods will obviously have a more severe impact on consumers. Obviously no protectionist scheme is going to tax goods that it's market cannot produce, but there is always a tendency to put industry above consumer, and assymetric/mercantile style protections in place. People often have intellectual debates about ideology/philosophy here, but nationalism is the real political force. If a government can be seen to steer its economy in the right direction, and its people feel well off compared to their neighbours, it will be popular, regardless of ideology, and regardless of how fairly it has treated other nations in trade negotiations. Likewise, a state will inevitably favor free trade when it will profit over other states, and protectionism when it won't. In the rare case when both states will benefit from an arrangement, there's usually some third party getting screwed, i.e. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/OPEC https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/OPEC I'm conflating capital controls with trade, but my point is more that they are often negotiated at the same time, and in the with the same ultimately selfish and unideological outlook.
spacecowboy_lon 11y ago
In the UK Back in the 60's you could not take more than small amount £50 out of the country.
WalterBright 11y ago
The purpose of currency controls is so you can inflate the currency and not suffer the consequences. Of course, the piper gets paid sooner or later, and a sharp and ugly correction becomes inevitable.
NicoJuicy 11y ago
I'm actually wondering ( since you live there), what the public opinion is about the West, since tourism crashed... Do you see any radical changes in the behaviour? ( i wondered about this when i realized the attacks would hurt Tunisia a lot)
Mimick 11y ago
The same on Morocco and politicians say so people who got money by corruption will not get them out, since here it's legally to not justify where you got your money from. So no need for money laundry. The real reasons is just because it's not healthy for a developed economy who can't compete with the world to not monitor the ins and outs... Also we don't have a real currency but our is called Dirham and it's basically 40% USD and 60% EURO, They adjust it by time to time and change those values depends on how EU or US doing so if one of those currency crushed hard ours don't (It was 20% USD, and 80% EURO so relax my US fellas you're doing fine :P). And if you got caught trying to speak even like DH10 ($1) out of Morocco it's a serious crime (while you can take it in another currency, that's why you find Dirham only on Morocco). Years ago I got my first credit card that world internationally (I tried 4 banks, it was just released, and they had too much technical issue AKA it's not working at all only one of them worked for me...) and it's capped at $1000 a year... you my think is nothing but it's like a dream for me... being able to get a couple of domains and servers is the dream.
- eveningcoffee 11y ago
  Do you have a black market for currency exchanges?
  - Mimick 11y ago
    You don't need it, you can do it legally on any bank or exchange office. Since getting money out is the illegal thing and not using another currency inside Morocco. If you're a politician or with a bit of power you can get money out of Morocco easily. Even when politicians caught doing that (no foreign nationality but owning stuff outside of Morocco) newspaper write about them and they respond with stuff like I really needed that since I have to send my son to study there... TL;DR: law don't apply on them...
    - LordKano 11y ago
      I think what he's asking is if there is some unofficial way to get money out. If someone who is very affluent wishes to visit Paris or New York for two weeks, how would he or she go about taking enough money to rent a room in a luxury hotel?
AnAfrican 11y ago
In my country, even legitimate transfers by commercial entities have to be "authorized". The idea is to try to keep some money in our economy but at the end of the day: - the process gets rigged anyway - it's costly to enforce - most of the cost of compliance is passed to us citizen
wallzz 11y ago
I was living in Algeria, now I live in France, and things there are worst comparing to Tunisa in term of economy freedom, we can exchange maximum of 15000DA the equivalent of 130 euro per year, so if you want to leave the country for holidays, you will for sure ends up in the black market.
bby 11y ago
same bro. i'm shorting tunisian currency right now
njs12345 11y ago
You might find the Wikipedia articles on international economics interesting - e.g. the "impossible trinity": https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Impossible_trinity https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Impossible_trinity

azernik 11y ago

In Israel, Rabin was actually Prime Minister twice; the first time was in the 1970s, when similar currency controls were in effect, including a ban on Israelis holding foreign bank accounts. He resigned after a journalist caught his wife withdrawing from an (illegal) US dollar account in Washington, DC.

danielbln 11y ago
"Do as I say, not as I do" seems to be the prevelant credo among politicians.
- draw_down 11y ago
  Strike that- humans.
- azernik 11y ago
  Well, he had the grace to accept responsibility and resign, even though it seems to have been purely his wife's initiative, so in the end the affair only increased the Israeli public's faith in his integrity.

pjc50 11y ago

The UK had capital controls until the 1970s. I see the GBP far up there on the opposite side of the chart; presumably that represents all the money rushing into the property bubble. I'm coming round to the belief that the big downside of free movement of goods/people/capital is the possibility of "sloshing": rapid change that capsizes the economy. Entire areas can dry up or become booms overnight. And because there isn't and can't be free movement of real estate to compensate, we get craziness in the property market.

keithpeter 11y ago
How much damping is needed to stop the sloshing but still allow 'organic' free trade, the kind of free trade that lets industries build up but without the short term bubbles? An aside UK property at the low end: the move from HA/Council rents to private rents (i.e. from around 350 to 750 per month outside the Great Wen) is going to make the current debate about livable wage interesting. Some Tories already coming round to rent cap/build for controlled rent.
osullivj 11y ago
Yes - the abolition of exchange controls was one of the first things Margaret Thatcher did when she became PM in May 1979.
leohutson 11y ago
Excess isolationism also makes the economy more vulnerable. For example, primary industries are more exposed by gluts in production flooding the market and driving down the value of goods, and shortages of domestically produced goods will obviously have a more severe impact on consumers. Obviously no protectionist scheme is going to tax goods that it's market cannot produce, but there is always a tendency to put industry above consumer, and assymetric/mercantile style protections in place. People often have intellectual debates about ideology/philosophy here, but nationalism is the real political force. If a government can be seen to steer its economy in the right direction, and its people feel well off compared to their neighbours, it will be popular, regardless of ideology, and regardless of how fairly it has treated other nations in trade negotiations. Likewise, a state will inevitably favor free trade when it will profit over other states, and protectionism when it won't. In the rare case when both states will benefit from an arrangement, there's usually some third party getting screwed, i.e. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/OPEC https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/OPEC I'm conflating capital controls with trade, but my point is more that they are often negotiated at the same time, and in the with the same ultimately selfish and unideological outlook.

spacecowboy_lon 11y ago

In the UK Back in the 60's you could not take more than small amount £50 out of the country.

WalterBright 11y ago

The purpose of currency controls is so you can inflate the currency and not suffer the consequences. Of course, the piper gets paid sooner or later, and a sharp and ugly correction becomes inevitable.

NicoJuicy 11y ago

I'm actually wondering ( since you live there), what the public opinion is about the West, since tourism crashed... Do you see any radical changes in the behaviour? ( i wondered about this when i realized the attacks would hurt Tunisia a lot)

Mimick 11y ago

The same on Morocco and politicians say so people who got money by corruption will not get them out, since here it's legally to not justify where you got your money from. So no need for money laundry. The real reasons is just because it's not healthy for a developed economy who can't compete with the world to not monitor the ins and outs... Also we don't have a real currency but our is called Dirham and it's basically 40% USD and 60% EURO, They adjust it by time to time and change those values depends on how EU or US doing so if one of those currency crushed hard ours don't (It was 20% USD, and 80% EURO so relax my US fellas you're doing fine :P). And if you got caught trying to speak even like DH10 ($1) out of Morocco it's a serious crime (while you can take it in another currency, that's why you find Dirham only on Morocco). Years ago I got my first credit card that world internationally (I tried 4 banks, it was just released, and they had too much technical issue AKA it's not working at all only one of them worked for me...) and it's capped at $1000 a year... you my think is nothing but it's like a dream for me... being able to get a couple of domains and servers is the dream.

eveningcoffee 11y ago
Do you have a black market for currency exchanges?
- Mimick 11y ago
  You don't need it, you can do it legally on any bank or exchange office. Since getting money out is the illegal thing and not using another currency inside Morocco. If you're a politician or with a bit of power you can get money out of Morocco easily. Even when politicians caught doing that (no foreign nationality but owning stuff outside of Morocco) newspaper write about them and they respond with stuff like I really needed that since I have to send my son to study there... TL;DR: law don't apply on them...
  - LordKano 11y ago
    I think what he's asking is if there is some unofficial way to get money out. If someone who is very affluent wishes to visit Paris or New York for two weeks, how would he or she go about taking enough money to rent a room in a luxury hotel?

AnAfrican 11y ago

In my country, even legitimate transfers by commercial entities have to be "authorized". The idea is to try to keep some money in our economy but at the end of the day: - the process gets rigged anyway - it's costly to enforce - most of the cost of compliance is passed to us citizen

wallzz 11y ago

I was living in Algeria, now I live in France, and things there are worst comparing to Tunisa in term of economy freedom, we can exchange maximum of 15000DA the equivalent of 130 euro per year, so if you want to leave the country for holidays, you will for sure ends up in the black market.

bby 11y ago

same bro. i'm shorting tunisian currency right now

njs12345 11y ago

You might find the Wikipedia articles on international economics interesting - e.g. the "impossible trinity": https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Impossible_trinity https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Impossible_trinity