Transaction Tax: What's in It for Buffett? December 06, 2009 http://seekingalpha.com/article/176714-transaction-tax-what-s-in-it-for-buffett
Where would that escalation come from? Can you see the scenario where the economy tanks again, unemployment is soaring and the banks have to be rescued AGAIN(the big ones have become even more systemically critical)? ALL three have VERY high probability of happening in 2011-2012 as the artificial stimulus of govt spending exhausts itself. No doubt we fight on but it is becoming clearer that this will not pass next year. No votes in the Senate. No international consensus. The REAL danger comes in the NEXT economic swoon led once AGAIN by the financials(they are already beginning to underperform). Meredith Whitney will be correct once more. When it comes, and it's a given, and if the Dems are still in control of Congress, we're in DEEP shit as the push for this tax will RESURFACE with a VENGEANCE. The Dems WILL deflect public anger resulting from THEIR failed "stimulus" policies by scapegoating Wall St. And the wasted money has to be recouped. We MUST get a Repub majority victory in 2010. Therein lies our fate.
We don't necessarily have to win in 2010. The key thing will be to get additional senate seats in 2010, thus being able to much easier enforce a filibuster. Nothing will happen as long as the senate refuses to go along with the House. And all you need to stop something in the senate is 41 senators. Currently we have 40. Last time I checked on intrade.com we are likely to have 44 Republican senators after the 2010 election. If that actually happens, and the GOP is actually against this tax (they have been suspiciously quiet), then we should be OK.
We need enough of a buffer because the public pressure will be potentially unbearable even for some Republicans.
maybe from a living organism small enough to cross border... like a virus... What's happening in the Eastern Countries of Europe now ? Is H1N1 only an aggregator ?
Supportive (against, that is) piece in the NY Post this morning about this stupid tax: http://www.nypost.com/p/news/business/crippling_stox_trade_tax_is_dc_dopiest_FjTzc9yyV3vnSdTzdPyXsM Comment section follows article.
Comments (4) GreenTraderTax 12/06/2009 2:39 PM Agree 100%. Passing a financial-transaction tax will turn New York City, Chicago and small-business traders who live on Main Streets into another Detroit. That will be the last straw for America's financial and capitalist leadership in the world. I feel Main Street anger towards Goldman Sachs and their cohorts. But, rather than use this shotgun transaction tax to destroy small-business traders (speculator market makers), hurt retail investors, and hinder small businesses that depend on hedging their products in the financial markets (like family farmers), why not focus populist anger in a more narrow manner targeted against big banks only? This can be achieved with reasonable financial reform and raising bank levies paid to the FDIC. Big bankers, especially those who still owe TARP funds, should smarten up and pay lower bonuses, only in stock rather than cash. Pay the government their tax share of stock bonuses in cash. GreenTraderTax 12/06/2009 2:41 PM Don't channel Wall Street anger against small-business traders living on Main Street, all around this country. Small-business traders use American innovation and productivity to succeed in their important role as speculator market-makers for the benefit of investors (selling stock and new IPOs), commodities, futures, and currencies. The speculator is credited with delivering fair, up-to-the-minute pricing. If the government is allowed to take and redistribute the short-term trading industry's innovation and productivity by unfairly replacing that savings with a placeholder transaction tax - and this is how sponsors of the bill explain it's fair - the short-term speculator market maker will disappear (be stifled) and the markets will wind up being unfairly priced. It's not in the public's (farmers, manufacturers, and other market users) interest to be stuck with distorted, inefficient pricing. The public won't stand for government-influenced poorly priced markets. They will pay for inefficient pricing, costing everyone much more than this harmful tax raises in revenues. No exemptions in the new bills presented in the House and Senate can prevent that - this poor pricing will affect retirement plans, mutual funds, and investors - simply everyone (including the retail investor Secretary Geithner says will be harmed with this transaction tax). Please sign my Petition "Save Traders' Jobs: Do Not Enact a Financial-Transaction Tax" at Rally Congress * Read more: http://www.nypost.com/p/news/busine...FjTzc9yyV3vnSdTzdPyXsM#comments#ixzz0YwJugngs
As it is, the better international prop trading firms are reluctant to come to the USA. This law will make sure that that are already here close shop.
I agree with much of what you say, with one exception. Why redirect populist anger? Why not recognize that a good portion of the problem here has to do with government to start with? Didn't many of the problems today start with the Community Reinvestment Act, an act which required banks to lend to borrows who essentially did not meet normal underwriting criteria. So lend they did. Borrowers certainly had their part in this, as did the banks. So the question becomes why punish banks? Frankly, they were loaned TARP funds, and they are paying them back. Why suggest that along with paying back, that a pound of flesh be exacted as well? My suggestion is that you stick with arguments against the tax, which there are many. Why give tacit approval to yet more government interference. I'm sure they don't need help in coming up with additional ways to interfere, and it diverts the basic message. OldTrader
Defazio is from the 4th District in the state of Oregon. Please write to him and to Pelosi about how foolish this idea is. Write to them even if you do live in California or Oregon. Also please email, call & fax your senators and congressperson. Here is one easy way to email them all: http://www.rallycongress.com/