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Today, SIFMA issued the following statement from Kenneth E. Bentsen, Jr., SIFMA president and CEO in response to the tax reform action plan unveiled by Rep. Van Hollen:
"We appreciate Mr. Van Hollen's search for innovative ideas to help middle-class Americans. Encouraging more savings makes sense. But, imposing what is effectively a sales tax on savers, mutual fund owners, pensioners and investors is neither new nor innovative. Rather it is an old idea with a long history of negative consequences for savers and investors and for the efficient functioning of capital markets. Mr. Van Hollen's proposed new sales tax on investors would be paid by every American that holds a retirement account, owns a mutual fund or is part of a pension plan. Retirees would likely be hit the most. It will raise the cost of saving and undermine what the congressman seeks to accomplish.
"Efforts to enact a similar tax in the European Union have hit opposition as Europeans have come to recognize the disproportionate damage to their own economies that could be caused by the broad-based levy proposed by the European Commission in 2013. Countries, such as France, that have gone ahead with smaller levies have raised less revenue than projected and their markets have been adversely affected. And, major public and private pension plans have raised strong objections as these taxes raise costs to their beneficiaries and adversely affect their ability to efficiently manage assets for their beneficiaries."
