Europe's Robin Hood Tax Is a Risky Proposal

It has been called a Robin Hood tax (a term favored by acolytes of British Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn) and a Tobin Tax, after the Yale economist James Tobin who popularized it. Whatever the name, a tax on financial transactions first proposed in 1936 by John Maynard Keynes may soon become a reality in 11 European countries.

Its ostensible purposes are to raise revenue and reduce risks from financial markets. Unfortunately, the evidence to suggest that it will achieve those goals is too, well, speculative.