A Tax on Financial Transactions

The Globe and Mail has an online story reporting Ontario Finance Minister Dwight Duncan's adamant opposition to any consideration of a tax on financial transactions at the G20. Although the article doesn't provide details, most of what I have read about such a measure would involve the following: 0.1 per cent tax on transactions of stocks and bonds and 0.01 per cent on derivatives.

While the advocates of unfettered capitalism are always reluctant to share, given the preferential tax treatment capital gains and dividends receive, such a measure would hardly be punitive, and would contribute substantially to efforts to relieve the grinding poverty in which much of the world lives. In the West, the revenues from the tax could be used for many purposes, including better funding for healthcare, climate change adaptation and costs, etc.

However, just as with proposals to combat climate change, I suspect that nothing will come of the G20 discussion for the same reason, namely that without universal application of such a tax, it would be unfair and counterproductive, or so we are told.

Clearly the North American powers-that-be have not been paying attention to the the needs of the people, as recently reflected in the Occupy Movement.