[bmelton]

Well, on logic, his plan simply won't work. This isn't my logical analysis, though I agree, but the considered opinion of many economists.

The plan, as put forth, is proposed to levy a .025%–.5% tax on stocks, .025%–.1% tax on bonds and .005%–.02% on derivatives with the funds going to health, public services, debt reduction, infrastructure and job creation.

Ignoring the claim that it's a "Robin Hood" tax, and that Robin Hood is being misunderstood here, the idea that it will capture wealth from the rich, or Wall Street, is not really supported in reality. What will likely happen is the same thing that happened when Sweden implemented their own financial transaction tax; the hard-core traders will simply start putting most of their transactions to foreign exchanges, and the bulk of those remaining will be the ones that can't easily switch, which are our pension funds, our 401Ks, etc.

The consensus amongst economic circles is that it will fail to attain even a significant fraction of the revenues it expects to, and that those taxes it does raise revenue from will impact the poor and middle class much more so than the rich it is targeting.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/timworstall/2012/06/20/the-stupi...

http://www.cnbc.com/id/45583134

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/comment/kamal-ahmed/88722...

[learc83]

>What will likely happen is the same thing that happened when Sweden implemented their own financial transaction tax

I'm not going to argue for the efficacy of the tax your talking about, but the differences in Sweden and the US are too large to make a valid comparison.

The US is the largest economy in the world, a small tax that pushes people out of Swedish markets may not do the same here--US markets may be relatively more attractive.

[bmelton]

They are currently very attractive. Once you implement a transaction tax on them though, they become less so.

When transaction volume begins shifting to an untaxed foreign exchange, the companies will begin the process of relisting to be on the foreign exchanges. The process (obviously) isn't easy or fast, but it's preferable to unallocated shares.

Beyond that though, as transaction volume dwindles, and it simply must do so, there are less transactions being taxed. The tax might work as advertised in the near term, but will fail through attrition in out years. Of course, by then, it will have been claimed a success and Bernie will likely be out of office, so it'll be blamed on the next guy.

And, of course, let's not forget the idea that for every $1.00 we increase college subsidies, colleges raise prices by $0.65.

[learc83]

That's not my argument. My argument is that your point about Sweden isn't valid because it's relatively much easier to avoid Swedish markets.