re: #238 Obdicut

Do you understand what the purpose of the taxes would be, Dark, or did you just see the word “Tax” and your knee shot up and slammed the underside of the desk?

Yes, I understand the stated purposes of the proposed taxes. To those purposes, I answer with the following points:

1: A transaction tax imposed on financial firms will be promptly passed on to customers in the same way most taxes on businesses are. Thus the proposed tax’s greatest effect will be to indirectly increase the tax burden on the public.

2: On the matter of “‘carried interest and ‘founders’ stock’” taxation, I offer no objection on this point at this time. This one does appear to be a reasonable idea. I’m not Grover Norquist, so I could accept it.

3: A “bank tax” would again be at least partially passed on to customers and would also potentially subject investment institutions to having their tax rates set based on the decision of government regulators as to what is and is not ‘reasonable’. Such decisions by said regulators might not even be driven by economic concerns, but rather by the political views of the administration in power. Such taxes offer a large opportunity for government to interfere in the private sector yet more.

3.1: Lastly, the idea of banks “paying for their own cleanup” is risible in my eyes. What will instead happen is that Congress will just spend the additional monies brought in by such a “bank tax” (or at best use it to pay off debt) and then get caught in bind if a bailout is needed.