Look before you launder

The Editorial Board recognizes the fact that many members of our current student body will one day be quite wealthy, and this editorial is for these future movers and shakers: Please for the love of God don’t use Mossack Fonseca for your money laundering and/or tax evasion needs. Given the recent leak that the liberal press deemed “the Panama Papers,” we believe that Mossack Fonseca failed catastrophically at its only purpose: keeping secret fortunes secret. Consequently, we cannot in good conscience let any of our peers make the same mistake that Sigurður Ingi Jóhannsson and the other 140 or so public figures implicated so far have made. Here are some alternatives to Mossack Fonseca you all should look into:

Number one on the list: show some initiative! Why outsource something simple enough to do yourself? I mean, your secret fortune is on the line here. We wouldn’t trust a shady Panamanian law firm with our (possibly) hard-earned dollars. Instead, why not skip the middle man and start a shell company yourself? You could name it something fun like “The Editorial Board’s Wild, Wacky Real Estate Investment Trust LLC.” Then get a company debit card that you can use for important business expenditures like country club memberships and a G-6. You’d blend right in with all the other faux corporation founders of the world and no one would suspect a thing! Pop champagne!

Another option is to use a more obscure law firm in another beautiful tropical nation to evade your taxes and launder your money. We’ve heard that Bora Bora is a wonderful winter getaway where the Piña Coladas flow and the questions about the vast sums of money you’re moving don’t. Apparently, everyone and their mother used Mossack Fonseca. The number of people implicated in this scandal is mind-boggling. We believe that you should dare to be different; don’t throw your business card into the crime bucket because your elite friends say it’s cool. Robert Frost once said to take the road less traveled by, and this advice couldn’t be more appropriate. Besides, if you branch out and find another firm for yourself, you can genuinely call that charming, aviator-wearing, cigar-chomping attorney your “money guy.” With a client list that allegedly includes Vladimir Putin, no one from Mossack Fonseca is actually “yours.” You better believe that your Bora Bora money guy wouldn’t miss your fake company’s Christmas party for the world.

Finally, you could just stash your money the old fashioned way. Pablo Escobar was the first drug lord to bury cash in 55-gallon barrels, but Walter White made it cool. Hiding your money in the desert really is a foolproof way to do it, and you don’t even have to be a drug lord. No fake filings with the IRS or international transfers means peace of mind for you, and you can’t put a price on that. Not to mention, there’s nothing like the water-color painted sky of a Sonora sunset; retrieving your bounty will be a pleasure in itself.