Fix the Broken Tax System.

The corporate tax system is broken, badly broken (Tax lobbyists help businesses reap windfalls. Boston Globe, March 17, 2013: A1, A8, A9).

The fix is simple: abolish the corporate tax. If many corporations are not paying it, then it does not serve as a reliable source of revenue. If many fine minds are engaged in counterproductive legal and lobbying activities to reduce taxes, a better use could be made of their talents.

The corporation tax should be replaced by a financial transaction tax. Such taxes are being introduced in Europe's financial centers so that such a tax imposed in the US would be unlikely to result in a flight of trading to foreign bourses.

A very small tax applied to the multitude of financial transactions would generate the funds to replace the lost corporate taxes and might even reduce the speculative frenzy that sometimes inflames stock and bond markets.

I am very disturbed by one phrase in your description of this agreement (Big Hedge Fund Pays $616 Million in Trading Cases, New York Times, March 16, 2013: A1,A3).

You say: "SAC ... holds one of the best investment records on Wall Street..."

I, too, could have a good investment record if I was able to enjoy multiple instances of trading on the basis of insider information.

With that kind of information it is easy to buy low, sell high, and short stocks with no danger of losses.