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Does it really matter if a billionaire stacks up billions in some Cayman account? If so, it is straightforward to use inflation to redistribute those digits. W
by arebop 10y ago
Does it really matter if a billionaire stacks up billions in some Cayman account? If so, it is straightforward to use inflation to redistribute those digits.
What I care about is a billionaire who buys up all the land in my country. The land can't be hidden and is therefore easy to tax. I care about a billionaire who eats gold leaf ice cream sundaes while the children across town are malnourished, but it is easy to tax gold and food sales at restaurants and groceries.
The big problem historically with sales tax has been that it is regressive, but with basic income that doesn't matter any more. There's no problem I know about with land taxes except misguided concern for the elderly and corrupt loopholes. Why not stop even trying to tax financial abstractions and just address hoarding?
- iopq 10y agoReturns on investment always beat inflation in the long run.
- madaxe_again 10y agoThose billions in a cayman account are dead money. They are the marginal efficiency of labour crystallised, and then transformed into a immotile instrument which benefits nobody. You say it does no harm, but why do you think we're still working 60 hour weeks when we've improved efficiency in all fields by orders of magnitude since industrialisation? All that efficiency gain's benefit was "realised" by the elites, but until that money is spent, loaned, invested, used - that value is destroyed. Sure, sure, tell me it's a store of value, but you'd still think the squirrel that stored 1000 tonnes of acorns for winter and wouldn't share, causing furry famine, to only then after winter forget where he left them and demand more acorns from the working squirrels was pretty damn irrational.
- svantana 10y agoMoney in bank accounts is not like acorns, it's more like having other squirrels owe you acorns. I don't see why that is such a big deal. People working 60 hour weeks has less to do with the Cayman islands than with those people needing a place to stay, and the demand of land far outstripping the supply, making it a zero sum game. That's why a huge land tax is a no brainer, but of course it will never happen, because the land owners can always pull out the old "poor granny won't afford to stay in her own house" argument and get all the sympathies on their side.
- te_chris 10y agoThe thing is, in a service based economy we desperately need the rich to buy ostentatious, pointless shit/experiences purely in order to retain jobs.