The Nation: Occupy Wall Street and the Pope Agree: It's Time to Tax Speculators

The Catholic Church has for many years raised objections to the patterns of globalization, concentration of wealth and economic equality that have encouraged the massive redistribution of wealth upward that has made the rich richer, the poor poorer and the middle class more vulnerable than at any time in generations.

And, now, as the Occupy Wall Street movement raises the issue of economic inequality, the church is stepping up with a proposal to begin to address the extreme injustice of a system that taxes working people for necessities but allows speculators to avoid even the most basic responsibilities.

On the eve of the G-20 leaders, the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace has endorsed a series of reforms to the global economic financial and monetary systems that features as its centerpiece the development of a financial transactions tax....

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The G-20 gathering in Cannes November 3 and 4 is expected to discuss a financial speculation tax, with strong encouragement from French President Nicolas Sarkozy and German Chancellor Angela Merkel—who says, “We must ensure that financial market actors share in the costs of fighting the crisis. I will push for this until it happens, at least in Europe, even better worldwide.

Sarkozy and Merkel have work to do; there is opposition within the G-20 even to an exceptionally modest 0.1-percent speculation tax. That opposition is coming from the United States and Canada, in particular. But there will also be pressure for the tax from outside the G-20, as unions from around the world rally at Cannes to agitate for the proposal.

The culture-jammers at Adbusters, who issued the “Occupy Wall Street” call, are calling on activists worldwide to rally October 29 for a “Robin Hood Tax” on all financial transactions and currency trades. National People’s Action (NPA), which refers to the financial transactions tax as a “take from the rich and give to the poor” initiative, is urging Americans to join October 29 rallies to “Rise Up and Fight for the Robin Hood Tax.”...

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