<story><title>The 99 percent</title><url>http://www.economist.com/blogs/dailychart/2011/10/income-inequality-america</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>guimarin</author><text>Five points for the OWS guys.&lt;p&gt;1. Transparency.  We need to see where every dollar of the US federal gov&apos;t is spent.  It needs to be on the internet, and it needs to be easily accessable.  An exception can be made for classified spending in specific, but not so categorically (IE we spend X on classified stuff).  Additionally, just like there is a Surgeon&apos;s General Warning on cigarette packages, there needs to be a link on every candidates webpage that lists their top 100 donors, and what industry they are in.  This website URL needs to be easily visible and placed in every television and radio advert as well.&lt;p&gt;2.  Investment banks cannot also be commercial (depository banks).  Investment banks become partnerships where c-level owners are financially responsible for the actions of their banks.  The banking system survived before things changed from this, and it will survive afterward.&lt;p&gt;3.  There should be a small federal tax on the sale of any type of derivative, bond, stock, or other financial instrument every time it is sold.  Say $.10 per share, every time.  The financial markets are for raising capitol for companies, not for financial hackers to make money.  HFT is a waste of time and energy, adds unnecessary volatility, and has yet to be shown to be anything more than tangentially related to the goals of a financial security market, established for the purpose of raising capitol.&lt;p&gt;4.  The tax code needs to be simplified.  There are a number of ways to do this, but the end goal should be to end loopholes that allow companies like exxon to pay no federal taxes.  Or any company for that matter to realize losses in the US and gains in a foreign country.&lt;p&gt;5. Finally, there should be a 4 term limit on US Senators, and an 8 Term limit on US Representatives.  Self-explanatory.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>othermaciej</author><text>A financial transaction tax is not that great in the first place, but making it $.10 per share instead of a percentage of the price paid is a bad idea. Let&apos;s do some math:&lt;p&gt;&lt;pre&gt;&lt;code&gt;  Activision-Blizzard Share Price (ATVI): 13.50
  Tax on a $100,000 trade: ~$7407.40
  Google share price (GOOG): $586.31
  Tax on a $100,000 trade: ~$170.55
  Berkshire Hathaway Class A share price (BRK.A): 117,100.000
  Tax on a $100,000 trade: ~$.10
&lt;/code&gt;&lt;/pre&gt;
Creating this massive disparity in the tax payable based on share price would cause massive market distortions in the short term. It would also lead institutional investors to pressure corporations to do massive reverse splits to drive up the per-unit share price to minimize the tax per transaction, which would lock small-scale retail investors out of the market in addition to being a huge waste of resources.&lt;p&gt;This idea is clearly half-baked. I think a number of your other ideas are as well. You need to think through what actual benefits you expect from your proposed changes, as well as what the unintended consequences would be. Your post does not explain this very well at all.&lt;p&gt;To cite another example: forcing a split between retail and investment banking is a common talking point from people who want &quot;more regulation&quot;. But most folks advocating for this do not have a coherent explanation for why this would actually be helpful. It&apos;s often claimed that deregulation contributed to the crisis, therefore we need to bring back this regulation. But the institutions that precipitated the crisis were all pure investment banks, so this regulation would have done absolutely nothing to prevent the financial crisis. This post does a great job of explaining why this particular policy proposal is poorly thought out, as well as covering the general issue of advocating policies without actually understanding what they would do or why they might be worthwhile: &amp;#60;&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2011/10/if-you-favor-a-policy-please-first-figure-out-what-it-is/247092/&amp;#62;&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2011/10/if-you-f...&lt;/a&gt;.</text></comment>
<story><title>The 99 percent</title><url>http://www.economist.com/blogs/dailychart/2011/10/income-inequality-america</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>guimarin</author><text>Five points for the OWS guys.&lt;p&gt;1. Transparency.  We need to see where every dollar of the US federal gov&apos;t is spent.  It needs to be on the internet, and it needs to be easily accessable.  An exception can be made for classified spending in specific, but not so categorically (IE we spend X on classified stuff).  Additionally, just like there is a Surgeon&apos;s General Warning on cigarette packages, there needs to be a link on every candidates webpage that lists their top 100 donors, and what industry they are in.  This website URL needs to be easily visible and placed in every television and radio advert as well.&lt;p&gt;2.  Investment banks cannot also be commercial (depository banks).  Investment banks become partnerships where c-level owners are financially responsible for the actions of their banks.  The banking system survived before things changed from this, and it will survive afterward.&lt;p&gt;3.  There should be a small federal tax on the sale of any type of derivative, bond, stock, or other financial instrument every time it is sold.  Say $.10 per share, every time.  The financial markets are for raising capitol for companies, not for financial hackers to make money.  HFT is a waste of time and energy, adds unnecessary volatility, and has yet to be shown to be anything more than tangentially related to the goals of a financial security market, established for the purpose of raising capitol.&lt;p&gt;4.  The tax code needs to be simplified.  There are a number of ways to do this, but the end goal should be to end loopholes that allow companies like exxon to pay no federal taxes.  Or any company for that matter to realize losses in the US and gains in a foreign country.&lt;p&gt;5. Finally, there should be a 4 term limit on US Senators, and an 8 Term limit on US Representatives.  Self-explanatory.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>mynameishere</author><text>&lt;i&gt;end loopholes that allow companies like exxon to pay no federal taxes&lt;/i&gt;&lt;p&gt;Corporate taxes are idiotic.  They should tax them at zero and replace the lost revenue with a new upper-margin tax.  Reasons:&lt;p&gt;1. Corporate taxes are effectively a sales tax.&lt;p&gt;2. Corporations, unlike individuals, can hire armies of lawyers, accountants, and lobbyists to get around the taxes.&lt;p&gt;3. Those same professionals are more often deployed by large, rather than small, companies.&lt;p&gt;4. Those same professionals are intelligent people wasting their intelligence on tax avoidance.  They could just as easily be useful to society.  Engineers, doctors, teachers, etc.</text></comment>