Quote from seasideheights:
A new story out tonight from the WSJ. Not good. I can't paste the copyrighted story, but check it out if you have a DJ news feed. Here's the headline & time of the story.
DJN: =WSJ: House Democrats Weigh Tax On Financial Transactions
(Dow Jones 10/09 18:36:56)
By John D. McKinnon
Of THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
Just finished reading the article. There is an interesting quote from Barney Frank:
In an interview Friday, Rep. Barney Frank, chairman of the House Financial Services Committee, said he supported the legislation's idea of recouping future losses from the industry.
"I was one of the ones who suggested" the idea for the TARP provision, said the Massachusetts Democrat. He said he didn't specifically propose a financial-transactions tax. The provision could be structured as either a tax or a fee, he said, and could be a one-time provision rather than a permanent tax.
That would make it less likely that parties to financial transactions would seek to escape the tax by moving activity to another country. He said imposing such a tax "country by country...would be a problem."
But then there is this from Paul Volcker:
In response to a question at a House hearing in September, White House economic adviser and former Federal Reserve Chairman Paul Volcker said it "might be interesting" if Congress ordered a study of the idea of a transactions tax. But he pointed to the problem of driving transactions to other countries. "That's the No. 1 problem; you'll have to get some consistency internationally," he said.
To me it doesn't really sound like Barney Frank is all for it. It sounds like he's talking about some kind of fee on the banks maybe?
-Guru