A stock transfer tax doesn’t impact upon people making serious long term investments. It makes those who manipulate stocks for short term bets pay a price for doing so.
A state tax on stock transactions was established in New York but was ultimately defeated by threats of building a trading floor in another state. A federal stock transfer tax would not suffer from this issue.
England has a similar tax and, despite declarations that such a tax would chill commerce, the London stock exchange is thriving.
A 2003 poll commissioned by the AFL-CIO showed that by 63% to 24%, New Yorkers favored re-instituting a stock transfer tax of one or two cents per share on stocks traded on the New York Stock Exchange.