The Economist magazine describes David Obey’s “Share the Sacrifice” war tax act as “a bill that probably should have been passed eight years ago”. However, it’s time for Wall Street to step up to the plate as well. I would like to see us go much, much further than this. I’d like to see a “Support the Troops” War Tax on Wall Street.
Here’s how it would work: institute a tax of 25 cents for each stock transaction. Plus, for all of the “too big to fail” banks, have an additional 25 cents per transaction tax when they trade for their house account. And this should last for as long as we have troops in Iraq or Afghanistan.
Given that Americans are being asked to sacrifice so much for these wars — and then asked to sacrifice AGAIN for Wall Street to have their gi-normous bonuses — it’s only fair that they share in this sacrifce they so gleefully have inflicted upon American taxpayers.
The Economist magazine describes David Obey’s “Share the Sacrifice” war tax act as “a bill that probably should have been passed eight years ago”. However, it’s time for Wall Street to step up to the plate as well. I would like to see us go much, much further than this. I’d like to see a “Support the Troops” War Tax on Wall Street.
Here’s how it would work: institute a tax of 25 cents for each stock transaction. Plus, for all of the “too big to fail” banks, have an additional 25 cents per transaction tax when they trade for their house account. And this should last for as long as we have troops in Iraq or Afghanistan.
Given that Americans are being asked to sacrifice so much for these wars — and then asked to sacrifice AGAIN for Wall Street to get those gi-normous bonuses — it’s only fair that they share in this sacrifce they have so gleefully inflicted upon American taxpayers.
After all, they were the ones who decided to unleash what Warren Buffet calls "financial weapons of mass destruction" upon our economy (pgs 13 - 15 of Warren Buffet's pdf report to his investors are particularly chilling to read). Wall Street obviously enjoys blowing things up — our economy, people's lives, our children's inheritances, just to name a few. And since they're all about being the "owners" of capital in our society, I say it's high time for them to fully invest their money — oh wait, that's actually OUR money, as in our taxpayer dollars — to pay for these wars.