Canadian Social Research Links 
The Tobin Tax Links Page --- Liens pertinents à la taxe Tobin

Updated January 22, 2006
Page révisée le 22 janvier 2006

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In 1978, James Tobin, a Nobel prizewinning American economist, proposed a very small tax on foreign exchange transactions to deter short-term currency speculation. Such speculation wreaks havoc on national budgets, economic planning and allocation of resources. Events including the Mexican peso crisis in 1994 and recent currency devaluations in Thailand and Southeast Asia have led to calls by governments and citizens for measures to curb currency speculation.

"Global currency trade amounts to approximately $1.3 trillion per day (by comparison, on the US stock market - NYSE, AMEX and NASDAQ combined - a "tiny" $10 billion per day is traded). Of this massive amount - cross-border purchases of goods and services which require foreign exchange account for only 2 percent ($5 trillion per year) of the total trading. Another $50 trillion per year (about 17 percent) of foreign exchange trading takes place with futures, options and derivatives to hedge against future exchange rate fluctuations. Exchange rate speculation - short or long term profit-seeking transactions - accounts for the remaining transactions, at least 80 percent. These speculative movements, which can take place rapidly and unpredictably, threaten to empty central banks' currency reserves.

James Tobin, David Felix, Rodney Schmidt, Paul Bernd Spahn and others have examined the possibility of levying a charge on international monetary transactions as a means to reduce exchange rate volatility and promote international economic stability. In addition, considering that annual currency trading is 10 times the global GNP, the revenue generating potential of a tax is tremendous. A modest 0.25 percent tax would generate over $300 billion per year (the total UN annual budget is about $10 billion) for peace and sustainable development."
Global Policy Forum

Global Policy Forum
New York
"Global Policy Forum monitors policy making at the United Nations, promotes accountability of global decisions, educates and mobilizes for global citizen participation, and advocates on vital issues of international peace and justice."

Tobin Tax Network Position Paper on the International Finance Facility
Tobin Tax Network
Fall 2003

Non-Aligned Nations Must Lead Financial Reform – India
February 23, 2003
"Indian Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee has called for a Tobin tax to protect the world’s developing economies. Vajpayee pointed out that a tax on currency transactions would be easier to implement than the measures to monitor terrorist financial channels introduced in two Security Council resolutions after 9/11. (Inter Press Service)"

Tobin Tax, the Movement and the Identity Crisis of the Left
October 23, 2002
"This article argues that the Porto Alegre movement has focused too much on the revenue aspect of the Tobin tax and too little on the original purposes of the tax: to stablize markets and give states more control over economic policy. (ATTAC)"

Currency Transaction Taxes (from the Global Policy Forum site)
- incl. links to over 60 featured proposals, analyses and articles about currency transaction taxes, from 2004 right back to the original Proposal for Monetary Reform
by James Tobin in 1978.


Stamp out Poverty: Campaigning for a Stamp Duty on Currency Transactions (PDF file - 749K, 12 pages)
April 7, 2005
The Tobin Tax Network has launched a campaign pushing the UK government to introduce a small tax on sterling currency transactions.

Stamp Out Poverty
Stamp Out Poverty works to raise billions of pounds through innovative sources of revenue to bridge the massive funding gap required to bring the world’s poorest people out of poverty. We are a network of more than 50 UK organisations, including Oxfam, Christian Aid, UNISON and War on Want, who have developed ideas such as taxing the banks on their trade in currencies, so that those that most benefit from globalisation give something back to those unlikely to see any of globalisation’s benefits. Working as part of MakePovertyHistory, the campaign saw great progress in 2005 with an agreement by several countries including the UK and France to set up an Air Ticket Levy to finance development as early as February 2006.


Currency Transaction Tax
Money has become a commodity rather than a means of exchange, trading at a volume of over US$ 1.2 trillion dollars per day. This enormous amount moves around the world without restriction, seeking maximum short-term profit. When currency speculators “bet” against a currency and rapidly withdraw billions from a country, they wreck havoc on its economy and people’s lives. Leading economists, including the late James Tobin, Rodney Schmidt, Paul Bernd Spahn and others have proposed that the international trade in currencies be taxed in order to promote international economic stability and help prevent financial crises. A global citizen’s movement has emerged in support of the currency transactions tax, or “Tobin” tax as it is often called. The tax is a means to reassert national economic sovereignty, help prevent financial crises and generate billions of dollars for global social development and environmental protection.


War on Want - United Kingdom
"War on Want fights poverty in developing countries in partnership and solidarity with people affected by globalisation. We campaign for workers' rights and against the root causes of global poverty, inequality and injustice."


ATTAC (Association for the Taxation of financial Transactions for the Aid of Citizens)
Links to groups in 16 countries advocating a Tobin Tax, including Canada (in French only, immediately below)

- ATTAC-Québec (Association pour la Taxation des Transactions pour l'Aide aux Citoyens)



Halifax Inititative
A Canadian coalition for global economic democracy
- incl. links to :  Debt -Export Credit Agencies - IMF - Tobin Tax -World Bank - About Us - G-20 - Finance for Development


National Union of Public and  General Employees Globalization Web Page
Globalization, and the corporate agenda it supports, have resulted in a tremendous redistribution of power, away from government and people, towards the market and corporations.
NUPGE publications on globalization - download over a dozen reports (in PDF format) on such topics as : currency speculators -  NUPGE at the WTO in Seattle -  the General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS) -  economic disarmament - Canada’s place in the new world economy - the impact of the (GATS) on Provincial Governments - and much more...

Tobin Tax time (May 1999 editorial, Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives -  CCPA Monitor)

Tobin Tax Motion Passes in Canada's Parliament
March 24, 1999



International

The Tobin Tax Initiative: U.S.
A project of the International Innovative Revenue Project, within the Center for Environmental Economic Development in California.
Tobin Taxes Update - February 2001
Date:  Sat, 17 Feb 2001 
From:  Ruthanne Cecil <cecilr@humboldt1.com
(copied from the e-mail newsletter) 
- incl. -- Labor leaders support CTTs (including AFL-CIO, DGB, NUPGE) - Prime Minister of India in support of Tobin-style taxes - Country reports on CTT activism (Porto Alegre) - Letters to the editor - Definition of Tobin Taxes.
Winter 2001 Tobin Taxes Update (U.S)
February 2001 
- Editorial, activist news (Social Summit, Geneva, Montreal, World Social Forum, etc.), links, announcements...

Tobin Taxes Update
May 2001
The Tobin Taxes Update is a monthly newsletter of the Tobin Tax Initiative USA. Tobin Taxes are domestic taxes on cross-border currency transactions, for the purpose of reining in market volume and volatility; restoring national sovereignty over monetary policy; and raising substantial revenue for urgent global environmental and human needs.
Source : The Tobin Tax Initiative (U.S.)

The Tobin Tax : Shifting the Tax Burden from Wages to Wagers
Short description of the Tobin Tax initiative plus links to six papers
Source : The Center for Economic and Policy Research (U.S.)

Tobin Tax Initiative - U.K.
- sister organization in in the United Kingdom.

Tobin Tax Campaign and Policy Network
Links to groups promoting the Tobin Tax around the world, including Canada

The Tobin Tax in the US Congress
April 2000
The full text of the DeFazio-Wellstone Initiative on Tobin-style Taxes



Tobin Tax for Social Development (6 pages)
Jasmin Enayati & Minu Hemmati, UNED-UK
June 2000
Source : Copenhagen +5 : A Social Development Resource For All Stakeholders

International Links to Tobin Tax  information - (excerpt from the above paper - all of these links are active)
 

Key organisations

CIDSE, Belgium (International Cooperation for Development and Solidarity
Coalition for Global Solidarity and Social Development - http://www.globalsolidarity.org/

Global Policy Forum, U.S. - http://www.globalpolicy.org/socecon/glotax/index.htm

Halifax Initiative, Canada -http://www.halifaxinitiative.org/

Tobin Tax Initiative, U.S.- http://www.ceedweb.org/iirp/

War on Want, United Kingdom - http://www.waronwant.org

Online Documents

Seattle opens way for Tobin Tax ATTAC. Newsletter (December 22, 1999). . http://www.globalpolicy.org/socecon/glotax/currtax/tobin.htm
New financial mechanism for sustainable development - green taxes for global needs? (CSD NGO Finance Caucus. NGO Position Paper 1) http://csdngo.igc.org/finance/fin_pos_paper1.htm
Joint Resolution on Taxing Cross-border Currency Transactions to Deter Excessive Speculation (DeFazio, P./ Wellstone, P). . http://www.ceedweb.org/iirp/ushouseres.htm

Costing the Casino - The real impact of Currency Speculation in the 1990s  (Hayward, H.). http://www.waronwant.org

Robin Round. Time for Tobin! (New Internationalist. Issue 320 - January-February 2000).  http://www.globalpolicy.org/socecon/glotax/currtax/tobtime.htm

There is an enormous demand for action and for acting together.  (New Internationalist. Issue 320 - January-February 2000. Sputnik Kilambi). 

http://www.globalpolicy.org/socecon/glotax/currtax/attac1.htm

The Tobin Tax and Exchange Rate Stability (Spahn, P.-B., 1996).. Finance and Development, Vol. 33, June, pp 24 -27 http://csdngo.igc.org/finance/fin_tobin.htm
Tobin Tax Initiative List of Principles (Tobin Tax Initiative). . http://www.ceedweb.org/iirp/princ.htm

Policy Proposals (Tobin Tax Initiative). . http://www.ceedweb.org/iirp/polprop.htm


GLOBAL POLICY FORUM
New York

"Global Policy Forum monitors policy making at the United Nations, promotes accountability of global decisions, educates and mobilizes for global citizen participation, and advocates on vital issues of international peace and justice."

Social and Economic Policy
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Bretton Woods Institutions & the World Trade Organization
Alternative Financing for the UN and Global Taxes and Charges

 
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