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Would you support a Financial Transaction Tax

Financial transaction tax?

  • Yes

    Votes: 6 24.0%

  • No

    Votes: 18 72.0%

  • Other

    Votes: 1 4.0%
  • Total voters
    25
Unitedwestand13

Unitedwestand13

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Location
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Liberal
Who would support the implementation of a financial transaction tax on American stocks, bonds derivatives, and other financial instruments?
 
I don't know whether I'd advocate for or against such a tax. Perhaps too I'd just be indifferent on such a tax. My position on the matter would depend on the nature and extent of the tax and what the tax revenue would be used for.

I'm certainly not among the "why pay less when you can pay more" crowd, but neither am I opposed to paying for services governments render. Similarly, I recognize that governments have to provide things that benefit a wide range of citizens; thus I don't "freak out" over there being government services provided and of which I don't/can't avail myself.
 
Why would I welcome another tax? Are you going to do away with 2 other taxes?
 
I haven't read these documents yet, but, depending on what I find about their methodological approaches, I may use their findings in arriving at a normative stance on the matter of a transaction tax.
What I won't do is form a abducted view on the matter when there is plenty of information available to obviate my needing to do so.
 
I voted NO

I am sick & ****ing tired of the multi layered government mafia TAXING my ass every time I take a ****ing **** ...............
 
Unitedwestand13 said:
Who would support the implementation of a financial transaction tax on American stocks, bonds derivatives, and other financial instruments?
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Absolutely not.
 
Unitedwestand13 said:
Who would support the implementation of a financial transaction tax on American stocks, bonds derivatives, and other financial instruments?
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No more damn taxes. Why don't we just roll up all the taxes into the personal income tax and include investment earnings as such?
 
distraff said:
No more damn taxes. Why don't we just roll up all the taxes into the personal income tax and include investment earnings as such?
Click to expand...

They already are included in your personal income tax. This would essentially be double taxing investments.
 
Nap said:
They already are included in your personal income tax. This would essentially be double taxing investments.
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My change is that I would tax income and investment at the same rate. And I don't believe in double-taxation. As few taxes as possible is the best approach.
 
distraff said:
My change is that I would tax income and investment at the same rate. And I don't believe in double-taxation. As few taxes as possible is the best approach.
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The reason investments aren't taxed at the same rate is encourage people to invest as that is good for society. Which is why you only get the lower rate after having the stock for over a year. Dividends and profit from selling stocks before a year is taxed at the same rate.
 
Nap said:
The reason investments aren't taxed at the same rate is encourage people to invest as that is good for society. Which is why you only get the lower rate after having the stock for over a year. Dividends and profit from selling stocks before a year is taxed at the same rate.
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You have a good point but the problem is that the stock market has turned us into a gambling boom-bust economy. Perhaps we shouldn't give speculation more economic priority than an honest salary. Salaries also produce economic activity as well.
 
distraff said:
You have a good point but the problem is that the stock market has turned us into a gambling boom-bust economy. Perhaps we shouldn't give speculation more economic priority than an honest salary. Salaries also produce economic activity as well.
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Thank you for that very useful & very sane post. America has become a casino.

I remember when that Bush baby wanted to privatize SS; if that would have passed hundreds of millions of Americans would have lost their potential SS benefits.

That Bush baby was a ****ing moron, anyways ...........
 
distraff said:
You have a good point but the problem is that the stock market has turned us into a gambling boom-bust economy. Perhaps we shouldn't give speculation more economic priority than an honest salary. Salaries also produce economic activity as well.
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Isn't this the argument in favor of a financial transaction tax?
 
Unitedwestand13 said:
Who would support the implementation of a financial transaction tax on American stocks, bonds derivatives, and other financial instruments?
Click to expand...

Already have one.
 
cuban smokes said:
Thank you for that very useful & very sane post. America has become a casino.

I remember when that Bush baby wanted to privatize SS; if that would have passed hundreds of millions of Americans would have lost their potential SS benefits.

That Bush baby was a ****ing moron, anyways ...........
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When it comes to SS if he had reformed it retirees today would have a lot more money because of how much the stock market has grown.

I think the social security program should be for everyone 80 years old or older. When social security originally started life expectancy was 62 years and you can only get benefits at 65 and that is why it was so affordable because so few people got benefits. Now life expectancy is 79 years and the ratio of people paying in to those receiving benefits is 2.7 to 1. Its projected to decrease to 2 to 1 in the next coming decades.

80 years is the cutoff and is high because I would slowly phase out social security with an investment-based program where everyone pays a certain percent of their incomes to the program and that will be added to income taxes. You then get a certain amount added to the investment portfolio of your choosing and the poorer you are the more you get. Half of social security will be replaced with this new program but that will be slowly increased over time.

So why investment? Investment is a big reason the rich are getting richer and the poor are getting poorer because the rich are investing more and the poor are investing less and during economic advances the rich invest most of their money and get huge profits from the stock market and trap most of the economic growth. The stock market is a reflection of how the rich are doing and the rich are doing better and better while the middle class has stagnated. While its had its ups and down the stock market has grown tremendously decade by decade because of how well the rich have been doing. So why not give the middle class a piece of some of that goodness? That is what my proposed social security reform would do.
 
Gaea said:
Isn't this the argument in favor of a financial transaction tax?
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Simply increasing the investment tax to the level of the income tax will have the same effect as a financial transaction tax. We already have are far too complicated tax system and the last thing we need is another layer of complexity. Tax preparation costs our economy 400 billion dollars per year. Lets decrease this not increase.
 
No. The government takes enough money out of our pockets.
 
distraff said:
You have a good point but the problem is that the stock market has turned us into a gambling boom-bust economy. Perhaps we shouldn't give speculation more economic priority than an honest salary. Salaries also produce economic activity as well.
Click to expand...

That is essentially why you give the lower tax after a year, if you know you will get more back from holding it for more than a year you will be less likely to sell earlier. Take that away and the stock market becomes more volatile as there would be less incentive to keep stock for longer periods. Perhaps we shouldn't tax an honest salary as much so that people can keep more of the money they earn.
 
distraff said:
No more damn taxes. Why don't we just roll up all the taxes into the personal income tax and include investment earnings as such?
Click to expand...

Yep, the 16A states that income from all sources is subject to taxation. Why different sources of income are taxed at different rates is unclear at best.
 
Nap said:
That is essentially why you give the lower tax after a year, if you know you will get more back from holding it for more than a year you will be less likely to sell earlier. Take that away and the stock market becomes more volatile as there would be less incentive to keep stock for longer periods. Perhaps we shouldn't tax an honest salary as much so that people can keep more of the money they earn.
Click to expand...

If you give a lower tax, people will be somewhat less likely to sell, but when the economy crashes people are going to panic anyway and pull out. The best way to decrease the boom-bust cycles is to invest less and that is done by not encouraging investment over an honest salary by giving it half the tax rate. Investment is good but so is productivity from salaried work and we need to maintain balance and right now we have an unbalanced economy. If we make tax rates flat between salary and investment I think the free market will decide a good balance rather than the government artificially creating one with radically different tax rates.

Another point is that sometimes the sacrifice of a simple tax code is that we have to let go of certain things we want to encourage. Because politicians have added new taxes or tax cuts to encourage or discourage certain things out tax cuts have become a massive beast.
 
Nap said:
That is essentially why you give the lower tax after a year, if you know you will get more back from holding it for more than a year you will be less likely to sell earlier. Take that away and the stock market becomes more volatile as there would be less incentive to keep stock for longer periods. Perhaps we shouldn't tax an honest salary as much so that people can keep more of the money they earn.
Click to expand...

If you give a lower tax, people will be somewhat less likely to sell, but when the economy crashes people are going to panic anyway and pull out. The best way to decrease the boom-bust cycles is to invest less and that is done by not encouraging investment over an honest salary by giving it half the tax rate. Investment is good but so is productivity from salaried work and we need to maintain balance and right now we have an unbalanced economy. If we make tax rates flat between salary and investment I think the free market will decide a good balance rather than the government artificially creating one with radically different tax rates.

Another point is that sometimes the sacrifice of a simple tax code is that we have to let go of certain things we want to encourage. Because politicians have added new taxes or tax cuts to encourage or discourage certain things out tax cuts have become a massive beast.
 
We got too many friggin' taxes already. How about a tax on proposing new taxes
 
distraff said:
If you give a lower tax, people will be somewhat less likely to sell, but when the economy crashes people are going to panic anyway and pull out. The best way to decrease the boom-bust cycles is to invest less and that is done by not encouraging investment over an honest salary by giving it half the tax rate. Investment is good but so is productivity from salaried work and we need to maintain balance and right now we have an unbalanced economy. If we make tax rates flat between salary and investment I think the free market will decide a good balance rather than the government artificially creating one with radically different tax rates.

Another point is that sometimes the sacrifice of a simple tax code is that we have to let go of certain things we want to encourage. Because politicians have added new taxes or tax cuts to encourage or discourage certain things out tax cuts have become a massive beast.
Click to expand...

There is no connection between earning a salary and investment income, I'm not sure what point you are driving at.
 
Nap said:
There is no connection between earning a salary and investment income, I'm not sure what point you are driving at.
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When you lower the tax rate on investment then you are encouraging investment. Right now the tax system is heavily biased so that people who earn income from speculation in the stock market get lower taxes than people who work real jobs and generate productivity for the economy. Businesses aren't only benefited by investment, their main source of income is revenue from customers, and this is affected by the income tax. If you raise/lower the income tax you affect the company's revenue, if you raise/lower the investment tax you affect its investments, I don't see why we have this bias to investment rather than income.
 
Considering that well over half our incomes go to taxes already; there are lots of "hidden" taxes you pay everyday but probably don't know it, I would be against any new tax schemes.
 
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