Trying to understand the financial crisis since 2008 economists have learned that large parts of the economy are hardly known and little explored. This is especially true for the area of the so-called shadow banks. Here - and not in the traditional banks - the crisis has manifested and they were saved from collapse by the central banks. But behind the shadow banks is the even more unknown zone of the offshore economy, since many shadow banks are legally settled in "tax and regulatory havens". They can be called secrecy jurisdictions as well. Their aim is to establish a high level of financial opacity, e.g. by banking secrecy laws, by establishing trusts and foundations whose ownership and purpose is difficult to identify, or by a lack in serious due diligence or no records and statistics on transactions. The book provides first information about a little-studied area. What is the importance of the offshore economy? Is online Gambling a Game Changer to Money Laundering? What is the rationale behind the Secrecy Index of Tax Justice Network? How does Automatic Tax Information Exchange function? Is Austria a tax haven? With which ideology and with which narratives was it possible to avoid public discussions about the offshore economy? Which were the effects of "offshore leaks" in the spring 2013?

Michaela Schmidt (Austrian Labour Chamber) and Walter Otto Oetsch (Institut for Comprehensive Analyysis of Economy, Johannes Kepler University Linz): The Political Economy of Offshore Jurisdiction Helene Schuberth (National Bank of Austria): The offshore system and the crisis of 2008 Petr Jansky (Institute of Economic Studies, Charles University in Prague): Illicit Financial Flows and Financial Secrecy Markus Meinzer (Tax Justice Network, International Secretariat London): Current practice of Automatic Tax Information Exchange in selected countries Laura Seelkopf (School of Humanities & Social Sciences, Jacobs University Bremen): Tax Competition and National Welfare Ingo Fiedler (Law and Economics, University of Hamburg): Online Gambling as a Game Changer to Money Laundering? Walter Otto Ötsch (Institut for Comprehensive Analyysis of Economy, Johannes Kepler University Linz): Opacity and Ideology Silke Ötsch (Institute of Sociology, University Innsbruck): Our Banking Secrecy is a Strong Castle. Assessing the State of Regulation by Analysing Metaphors and Narratives of the Offshore Economy Martina Neuwirth (Vienna Institute for International Dialogue and Cooperation): Austria's banking secrecy Otto Farny (Austrian Labour Chamber Vienna): Austria: A tax haven? Peter Hornung (Norddeutscher Rundfunk): Global Investigations: The international journalists' project offshore leaks