Don’t think there’ll be a better comment then this one above. Says everything that needs to be said.

Sorry, Nikolas, but not really. It won’t be introduced across the EU unless it’s introduced across the whole world which simply isn’t going to happen.

I agree with you Damocles but at the very least for Ireland to join it would have to be a universal EU move for the moment.

So introducing it on a per county basis is akin to shooting ourselves in the foot. Up there with not having standardised alcohol and tobacco prices throughout the EU. Per country basis can’t work. Throughout the EU might work. Worldwide won’t happen without would wide agreement. I do see the funny side of my disagreeing with taxation, though…

I think it could be done across the Eurozone. the EU won’t happen as the Brits will veto that one.
As it is the banks that got us into trouble, it makes sense to make them pay some of the debts back.
If Ireland would introduce this it wouldn’t be as harmful as people make out, but it wouldn’t be a clever move.

explain that now?

Orion: There was this guy, Brian Cowen. Kinda coarse, dull really. He and his friend Brian Lennihan covered the losses the banks sustained when the market collapsed. You see, there were a lot of speculators–or as they call themselves, “investors” who were betting six ways from Sunday on all manner of things. Financial instruments they called them. But they were really gambling, you see. So when they all had a run of bad luck, they came crying to the two Brians, screaming that the “sky was falling”. It was really just their own sky, but the Brians bailed them out, and in the process, bankrupted the Irish State. Now we all have to pay sixty thousand euro for their mistakes. A financial transaction tax would make THEM (the gamblers, not the Brians) pay for their mistakes. Does that clear up the confusion?

It’s the non-EU business I’d be worried about ( US, Asia and India ). They could just avoid routing transactions through participating countries.

Having worked for a financial company many years ago that moved a huge amount of its trades to Ireland from its home market because it was cheaper for them to do business here, I have no doubt that if it became dearer to trade in Ireland that same company would simply move it trades elsewhere and wouldn’t think twice about it.

@Jim is right. This tax can only work if don EU or at least Eurozone wide.
Here in Ireland we have other means to get the top, if this government would be willing to do so.

Ireland was fecked up by reckless borrowing and lending on property and corrupt politicians giving are money to their EU and American banking bosses. This tax would have made no difference as it’s on share and currency transactions .

Not so , Daniel. What will happen is the the Companies effected will move to London . At present about 30,000 people engaged in that area. Big job losses

These taxes are on high end financial trading not retail banking. The consumer in this case is not the ‘man on the street’.

I personally recommend that man on the street start investing their savings. The state is clearly not a reliable investor or protector of our interests. The state operates at a massive loss to the average worker.

….like when the ordinary Joe sells a couple hundred thousand shares of Google…

Yeah because the current strategy of maintaining ourselves as the Cayman Islands of Europe is working wonders, we only have what 400,000 unemployed now? Lets keep doing the same thing, and soon we will get different results! After all even a stopped clock is right twice a day!

Sure, we don’t want to have a fan coal services industry in this country, do we?

Sure, we don’t want to have a financial services industry in this country, do we?

Introduce a financial tax and you will see that 400,000 unemployed increase alot more, the cayman islands of europe you see yourself?? Increase your corporation tax to the european average and Ireland would have alot more unemployed. Nikolas the IFSC employs over 30,000 people. Thats big for a small country like Ireland. Bring in a tax and it will disappear.

Mark, Nikolas is agreeing with you and being sarcastic towards Dave.

It’s true, I’m afraid. Having a financial services industry is a good thing..

By that logic France, Germany, Belgium, Austria, Portugal, Greece, Slovenia, Estonia and Spain are all going to lose their financial services jobs!

Never mind the jobs that can be created through the revenue (which would probably be huge in this country!) collected from the tax, never mention that.

Dave, some businesses are already relocating countries on the basis of taxation changes.

Damocles

I’m sure you’d like to not charge them any tax at all, in fact why not give them money to come! Maybe that would stop some other country from under cutting you, and in the mean time the roads and infrastructure that presumably those companies will need can come from the fairy tree.

How low can you go.

“I’m sure you’d like to not charge them any tax at all”

Nothing I’ve written should give that impression to any reasonable person.

Damocles

But its the logic of what you say, you can’t tax companies because they will leave, but any country can under cut you, so you have to undercut them and they have to undercut you, until you eventually charge no tax.

Nothing I’ve written should give that impression to any reasonable person.

I think you are stuck on repeat there Damocles. Or maybe its just that you are devoid of arguments after your straw man was pulled down?

I felt it was a response that deserved to be repeated, in this context.

Dave get real, France introduced a 75% tax on the rich , they relocated alot of that wealth to London. That’s what most companies will do, don’t be in denial……Ireland will lose hundreds of millions every year and alot of jobs will be lost if a financial tax is brought in.

@ Dave – there tax itself would be a good thing. The implementation of the tax on a country by country basis is the problem. Companies will leave Ireland if er impose the tax but our nearest neighbours don’t. It’s like owning a shop and raising the price of a lite of milk while the shops on their side keep their prices low.

Why bother with it then?

Stephen, the idea of reducing tax rates to increase overall tax revenue makes socialists brains explode. Now, while that’s funny and quite satisfying it can be quite messy and a little bit cruel.

It is just a bit , but since they enjoy taxes so much lets just put up the price of cigarettes again to create more jobs for our eastern european friends smuggling them in.

@ Damocles – I’m a socialist but my skull’s still intact. Ahhhh, maybe you mean the “I don’t know what socialism means but I get to wear a Comrade Che T-shirt” socialists? They won’t get me in their gang, so I suppose I’m not a “real” socialist anymore, what with my dreams of reducing and eventually eliminating the welfare class and achieving a stable sustainable economy that benefits the majority and all. Oh well…

@ Stephen – it depends what you mean when you say reduce taxes. Reducing tax revenue overall is probably not a good idea while we have a public spending deficit, but drastically reforming how the tax revenue is allocated is essential. I’d still argue that it is not that people don’t have enough money, increasing wages and social welfare payments Iis unsustainable, it’s that the cost of living is too high for the wages earned. Reducing the cost of living to EU norms would be the best long-term strategy for this country.

Unfortunately Nikolas you are a Socialist, however you’re a Socialist in the traditional sense rather than the “Oooh let’s blame the ‘banksters’ and the ‘government’ for all life’s woes, and let’s tax the rich until they’re poor that’ll teach ‘em” sense.

You probably understand the need for balance between economic systems.

“Keep subsidising corporations with little or no tax to create a negligible amount of jobs, while continuing to crucify ordinary people with VAT and stealth taxes?”

At the risk of repeating myself, nothing I’ve written should give that impression to any reasonable person.