What is the attitude of British towards the financial-transactions tax? [origina

Britain’s attempt to stop 11 other European countries from adopting a financial-transactions tax (FIT) was blocked by the European Court of Justice this week. Further legal challenges will doubtlessly be mounted, prolonging the battle between proponents of this "Robin Hood tax" — aimed at punishing the finance industry — and those who believe the EU is exceeding its powers by allowing a levy (imposed on every trade) that will have repercussions even in countries that do not participate.
   The pass-through argument that an FIT will be passed on to clients undermines the Robin Hood element of the levy, since pension funds and retail investors will bear much of the burden. Taxes on corporate profits, for example, are passed on to consumers in the form of higher prices or to workers in the form of lower wages. Nor is the argument that an FTT will restrict liquidity particularly compelling. Enthusiasts for free markets have turned liquidity into a bit of a fetish, using it to justify the activities of high-frequency traders. The idea is that more liquid markets reassure investors because they can abandon their holdings with ease; the result is a lower cost of capital, which leads to more investment. The markets may be very liquid on an average trading day, but illiquid in a crisis. If institutional investors believe that other market participants are better informed (because they have advance information on order flows, for example) , they may be less willing to trade. "It would be an extreme example of the lemons problem. "