Another Idiotic Idea

And another attempt to emulate the blatantly failing European model.  This one is backed by the AFL-CIO and the National Nurses United unions….

With that union backing, the Democrats (led by Congressman Peter Defazio (D, OR) in the House and Senator Tom Harkin (D, IA)), are pushing a bill that would impose a .03 cent tax on all financial trades.  Defazio says,

It would benefit long-term investors with stability

but

It’s “tiny,” and it would cost the “average investor” just $1 per year.  Let me see if I understand the logic of this.  It’s too small to matter to the little guy (and since it’s not a progressive tax, it’s even more trivial for the big players) but it’ll influence everyone to move toward trading market stability.

Then Defazio added this:

[I]t will still generate about $35 billion a year in income—income that could be used to rebuild the real economy, infrastructure, other investments.  Or money that could be used to help defray our deficit.

Yeah, sure.  We saw how much the last several Progressive stimulus spending packages did for our “infrastructure” and all those shovel ready jobs that President Obama yucked it up about not actually being shovel ready.  On top of which, when was the last time either party used tax money to reduce a budget deficit, rather than as seed money with which to leverage even more spending?

And this:  Bill Gates and George Soros are cited as backing this…idea…as a fine way to “painlessly” raise “a lot of money without affecting growth.”  There’s that false premise, again, this idea that the government needs more money.

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