EU Transaction Tax

Revenue-generation or revenge?

I was most interested by an early morning news item regarding the proposed transaction tax. Jose Manuel Barroso, president of the EU Commission, urged a 'yes' in the vote today in the German parliament regarding the bailout of Greece. Where Merkel sees the opportunity for German to accentuate its control and supremacy within Europe (a growing trend perhaps, I understand that conquest by finance is the preferred means of conquest these days?) others merely see more of Germany's being thrown down the drain trying to support 'waster nations' like Greece.

Barroso accentuated the need for the transaction tax (and Eurobonds) as a means of generating something in excess of fifty billion Euros, money that could be used to bail out faltering economies. Of course, those EU members who do not subscribe to the Euro are less inclined to see themselves paying out money when when they know there's nothing in it for them (prudent thinking or a lack of generosity? Then again we'd only probably be expecting generosity in Christian circles.).

One financial expert calculated that the money raised by a transaction tax would be nearer ten billion Euros and estimated the cost of collecting the money to be around twelve! When this was pointed out, the response was that it was more about 'making a statement' and 'making the bankers pay' than just bringing in money! The revenge issue is something the mindless moronic readership of some of the British rags will applaud when they read it this morning, after all it's revenge and that has to be good, doesn't it?

So we have Ireland, Greece, Spain and Portugal all swaying in the breeze and whilst we read about powerplays and posturing across the board there are people in Greece who have to choose whether they eat or buy essential medicines. There are blind and otherwise disadvantaged people who have lost benefits and now struggle to exist and we are looking more like the third world in the West.

We have truly lost our way and have let our possessions, the culture of self and the desire for revenge rule us and in return have seen any sense of equity, justice and mercy depart.

Pax