Fighting poverty - Why did we reject tax?

It was reported this week that hedge fund manager and Bank of Ireland bond holder David Tepper earned, if that is not a corruption of the word, €2.5bn last year.

Yesterday Church of Ireland primate Archbishop Richard Clarke challenged the island’s leaders to express a vision that would, among many things, challenge growing poverty and a culture of entitlement. He pointed out how “the poor ... are becoming poorer and in some cases destitute”. He referred too to a growing dependency on food banks in this, a very rich country.

In the last week the EU took a step towards imposing a financial transactions tax to try to bridge the gap between Mr Tepper’s world and the world of those described by Archbishop Clarke. Ireland refused to endorse or impose the tax. There may be myriad reasons for this but it is hard to think of one as pressing as redressing the dangerous imbalance between the über-rich and the world’s ordinary souls.