Re: Robin Hood didn't steal from the poor.
The idea of a financial transaction tax has been kicking around North America for months now. Average Americans, during the depths of the current recession, recognized that market speculation and incredible amounts of trading had a large role in tanking the whole economic system.
The idea to put a tax on the trading makes perfect sense. It reduces the amount of speculation and trading by making it more expensive to do so. This type of behaviour is usually engaged in by very wealthy individuals with high amounts of liquid assets that can be easily moved around.
Typical families do not engage in that kind of stock market activity. They tend to invest and hold their investment for lengthy periods of time, meaning this tax would be minimal on them. It could be a very effective way to tax the wealthiest bracket of society; a bracket which has recently been shown as often fiscally reckless and irresponsible.
It is true that developed nations did not receive billions in handouts, but instead relied on stolen labour, plunder, and productivity through slavery and colonization - a process that is ongoing today, albeit under different names.
The fact is some individuals are finally realizing the damage that was done from generations of large-scale abuse and are proposing a potential way to help alleviate it. By helping these nations we could do a lot to mitigate problems like high birth rates, which in turn reduces problems like the spread of AIDS. The money, of course, would have to be used responsibly by our politicians and not simply turned into one more corporate give away.
Michael Gomes
Prince George
