In his 1972 Janeway Lectures at Princeton, James Tobin, the 1981 Nobel Prize winner for economics, submitted a proposal for a levy on international currency transactions. The idea was not greeted with enthusiasm, as the 1970s were a period of optimism and confidence in floating exchange rages....

Contents -- Acknowledgements -- Prologue -- Overview -- The Tobin Tax as an Instrument of Global Monetary Policy -- 1. Taxing International Financial Transactions to Enhance the Operation of the International Monetary System -- 2. How Well Do Markets Work: Might a Tobin Tax Help? -- 3. The Tobin...