KMT Wants Stock Transaction Tax "postponed"

There is nothing so permanent as a temporary emergency -- Robert A. Heinlein

The KMT moves to protect one of its most important constituencies, the nation's wealthy non-taxpayers, by mooting a delay in the implementation of the stock transaction tax.

Several legislators called on the government to postpone levying a capital gains tax on stock transactions because the stock market continues to remain sluggish. KMT legislator Sun Ta-chien (孫大千) proposed raising the stock transaction tax from the current 0.3% to 0.35% and postponing the effective date of the recently passed capital gains tax on stock transactions. Moreover, as the capital gains tax on stock transactions would take effect on January 1, 2013, a high- ranking KMT official stated that the Legislative Yuan and the Cabinet could jointly propose a "sunrise clause" to postpone its implementation.

As I've noted a few times since the election (and before), I suspect a key hidden factor in the election was the support of the class of non-taxpaying holders of capital wealth for Ma. Now they are getting their money's worth out of the KMT.

Another factor here is the role of the stock market as an indicator of the nation's economic performance. Obsessive interest in rankings are a key cultural trait of the Taiwanese; playing with the stock market is playing with a major component of the national psyche.
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