February, 09 2015, 12:00pm EDT
For Immediate Release
Contact:
Charles Idelson, 510-273-2232,,Jennifer Flynn, 212-537-0575,Carl Ginsburg, 917-405-1060
In Response to Reports HSBC Helped Clients Dodge Tax
In response to reports HSBC helped clients dodge tax, David Hillman, spokesperson for the Robin Hood Tax campaign, said:
"This exposes once again the rotten core of banking - it would be shocking if it weren't for the frequency with which we hear of such scandals.
"It shows a sector not content with dodging its own obligations, but also conniving to help the richest people shirk their responsibilities to society as well.
WASHINGTON
In response to reports HSBC helped clients dodge tax, David Hillman, spokesperson for the Robin Hood Tax campaign, said:
"This exposes once again the rotten core of banking - it would be shocking if it weren't for the frequency with which we hear of such scandals.
"It shows a sector not content with dodging its own obligations, but also conniving to help the richest people shirk their responsibilities to society as well.
"It's clear our softly softly approach to the banking sector is wholly inadequate - it's time we ensured banks were working in the public's interest instead of conspiring against us."
The U.S. Robin Hood Tax would set a 0.5% tax on the trading of stocks, 50 cents on every $100 of trades, and lesser rates on trading in bonds, derivatives and currencies in the U.S. It marks the return of a tax on financial transactions in place in this country during the years 1914 to 1966. Some form of the financial tax is in place today in more than 40 countries. Who's behind it? We are Nobel Prize-winning economists, former US Vice Presidents and founders of Microsoft. We are Ronald Reagan's Budget Director, the UN's Secretary General and the Archbishop of Capetown. We are union members, nurses, small business owners, community organizers, faith leaders, AIDS activists, environmentalists, movie stars and musicians, and we are part of a global movement of more than 220 million people in 25 countries who are fighting for a Robin Hood Tax - a small tax on Wall Street trades. We are a force to be reckoned with, and we are demanding justice.
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U.S. President Joe Biden on Thursday announced that he is commuting the sentences of nearly 1,500 Americans and pardoning 39 people convicted of nonviolent crimes, a move the White House described as "the largest single-day grant of clemency in modern history."
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According to a White House fact sheet, those who received commutations "have been serving their sentences at home for at least one year under the Covid-era CARES Act," a law that extended the amount of time in which people could be placed in home confinement to reduce the spread of the virus in prisons.
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