About 200 nurses marched downtown to a major bank to push one specific issue - the transaction tax. It is basically a fee charge to anyone and everyone to anyone who makes a financial trade. People call it a tax on Wall Street.
At 11 Thursday morning members of the California Nurses Association were ready to march in support of the Occupy movement, but most of the Occupy SF protesters were still asleep. So the nurses went on without them. They marched down California Street to Wells Fargo Bank.
"Decent paying jobs, health care, quality public education, housing, those are the priorities we are for," said Greg Miller from the California Nurses Association.
The Nurses Association came with an issue to rally around. A tax on Wall Street called the transaction tax.
"This is a tax on Wall Street. It's a .05-percent tax on all sales of bonds and stocks," said Liz Jacobs with the California Nurses Association.
"We want that to go to the general fund to help provide health care, education and affordable housing," said Erin Carrera with the California Nurses Association.
Other unions representing nurses also rallied in L.A., D.C. and in France where the G-20 finance ministers meeting is being held. At that meeting, a European transaction tax will be on the agenda, in part to help resolve the debt crisis there.
England already has a similar tax called the Stamp Duty. But Wall Street opposes the tax and so does Treasure Secretary Tim Geithner. President Barack Obama does not support it.
"If the United States did this and no other country did it, then people would basically abandon Wall Street and go to other markets and trade there. So if you are going to do it, you would have to do it everywhere," said ABC7 political analyst Bruce Cain.
With a GOP-controlled house, any kind of legislation would be dead in the water.
"It doesn't matter, they can't shut us up. This is the 99 percent. You can't quiet them, you can't tear gas them, there's 99 percent of us," said San Francisco resident Carita McCormick.
Wells Fargo released an official statement saying, "Wells Fargo is committed to serving the financial needs of our customers, keeping credit flowing, and working to help those facing financial hardships find solutions."
