It really is. People flee high-crime/high-corruption countries for good reason. They also have demonstrably worse economies over the long term. KYC/AML efforts are only part of the difference, of course. But we've ended up with KYC/AML because it's one of the least intrusive ways of keeping crime in check.
If you think otherwise, I encourage you to go live in a high-crime/high-corruption country and let me know how much you're enjoying the "freedom".
I can honestly see that this could be the case. But I can honestly see that it might not be. A related situation would be occupational licensing: maybe it saves society money, maybe it costs society money; how certain are we that we are at the correct balance?
Well occupational licensing is the same way. If there was even a shred of a farcical bad-faith argument that it saved money they'd be happy to spout it. The fact that the proponents don't even have that and instead shove appeals to emotion in your face tells you everything you need to know.
Is it really though? How much was the US (or any other equally developed country) losing to crime and corruption prior to all this KYC/AML BS? Not that much. Letting a mobster have a bank account doesn't magically turn your country into Nigeria. If anything it makes your country better because the mobster doesn't have to store that value another way and then protect it (with violence). >Criminal enterprises work through violence and add risk throughout the economy
So like government but with less abstraction?
> But unlike criminal gangs, they don't settle them with shooting wars in the streets.
Only because they don't have to. Being an above the table enterprise they can just go to the government court system and get their (credible threat of) violence that way.
All this violence you're complaining about w.r.t. organized crime is just their (low buck, because due process is expensive) way of settling business disputes.