Photo by Craig Hudson PhotoAt 2:00 pm this afternoon, Occupy D.C. protesters will march from McPherson Square to the Treasury Department, joining in solidarity with Occupy Wall Street protesters around the world in a call for G20 leaders to adopt the Robin Hood tax. The Occupy D.C. protesters will welcome economist Dean Baker for a talk on the tax.
Kalle Lasn, editor and founder of Adbusters — the magazine that spearheaded the Occupy Wall Street movement — flagged earlier this month that this would be one of the protesters’ concrete demands.
From Occupy D.C.’s press release:
Wall Street’s reckless trading of risky financial products like mortgage-backed securities, credit default swaps, and derivatives helped redistribute wealth to the rich and wreck the global economy. Despite receiving enormous publicly-funded bailouts, bankers have yet to pay for the damage they caused. Now we’re being told there’s no money for what the 99% needs to: create jobs, get healthcare to millions of Americans, support green energy efforts, ensure AIDS drugs for Africa, protect Social Security, and more.
Creating a financial transaction tax, also known as a Robin Hood tax, would return funds from the financial sector to public coffers and discourage some of Wall Street’s most dangerous activities.
