Buffett Opposes Obama Bank Fee, Likens Plan to Taxing Congress

Business Week reports:

Warren Buffett opposes President Barack Obama’s proposed levy on financial institutions because firms including Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and Wells Fargo & Co. already repaid bailout funds.

“I don’t see any reason why they should be paying a special tax,” said Buffett, the chairman and chief executive officer of Berkshire Hathaway Inc., in an interview on Bloomberg Television today. Supporters of the plan to tax the banks “are trying to punish people,” he said. “I don’t see the rationale for it.”

Obama announced a plan last week to impose a fee on as many as 50 major financial companies to cover as much as $117 billion in losses from the federal government’s Troubled Asset Relief Program. The levy would apply to firms with more than $50 billion in assets and would exclude Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the government-sponsored mortgage lenders that had to be taken over by the U.S.

“Look at the damage Fannie and Freddie caused, and they were run by the Congress,” Buffett said. “Should they have a special tax on congressmen because they let this thing happen to Freddie and Fannie? I don’t think so.”

Warren dares to mention Fannie.