4 ms·

Redistribution is done via tax rather than confiscating stock. The popular idea is some kind of wealth tax. Often goes hand in hand with UBI.

imgabe 9y ago
The wealth is in the form of stock. If they hold the stock, and they're not selling it, where does the tax come in? They would have to sell the stock in order to pay the tax, paying capital gains tax in the process? Bezos doesn't have $95 billion sitting in a savings account. Let's pretend it's land instead of stock. If I own a parcel of land with $10 million, but don't have much cash, and the government wants to tax me 10% of my wealth, where do I get the money to pay the tax? I'm forced to sell off part of the land? What, every year? Until I don't own anything anymore?
- alex_young 9y ago
  They could sell some of the stock to pay for that the same way their employees do when their stock grants mature couldn't they?
  - imgabe 9y ago
    So you're forced to slowly give up more and more of your company? What if you're trying to keep a certain percentage to maintain control?
    - s17n 9y ago
      You can't. The whole point of a wealth tax is to prevent people/families from staying wealthy forever.
      - vixen99 9y ago
        The acquisition of wealth is not a zero sum game so why would you want people/families to get poorer ('stop them from staying wealthy forever'). How about getting people to climb up rather than forcing some down? Your idea of the 'point of a wealth tax' is a curious one. I am not aware anyone has suggested this aside from failed communist regimes where remarkably, some families at the apex who make/made the rules continue/continued to live rather well.
        s17n 9y ago
        The current conversation about a wealth tax was jumpstarted by Thomas Piketty, who argues that the natural tendency of a capitalist economy is to make the rich get richer and the poor to get poorer (relative to each other - in absolute terms everybody should be getting richer). Basically the point of the wealth tax is to provide a counterweight to that tendency.
    - keithnz 9y ago
      Again, depends on a wealth tax, but if its the same as the tax you'd pay if you had that wealth sitting in the bank, and its worth billions but you never get a return, then very very slowly you'd lose tiny fractions of your company. Yes. But that would be a very odd situation
- keithnz 9y ago
  Depends on how you design it. But if your wealth is tied up purely in stock that gives you no return in terms of cash, then yes, you'd likely have to sell some of that stock.
- keithnz 9y ago
  Responding to the Edit about land: Well actually wealth tax is often used as an idea to control property prices. If you own $10 million in land. That land makes you no money, you'd have to work out how to make money from the land or diversify to make a minimum return that covers the tax. The consequence of which is land/property becomes a less desirable investment compared to say investing in businesses unless that land actually makes a return. Theirs pros and cons and a lot of discussion on wealth tax etc. But taxing income also has pros and cons. The question is do you want tax to tax evenly across peoples wealth, or do you want it to tax evenly across income? or some mixture of both?

imgabe 9y ago

The wealth is in the form of stock. If they hold the stock, and they're not selling it, where does the tax come in? They would have to sell the stock in order to pay the tax, paying capital gains tax in the process? Bezos doesn't have $95 billion sitting in a savings account. Let's pretend it's land instead of stock. If I own a parcel of land with $10 million, but don't have much cash, and the government wants to tax me 10% of my wealth, where do I get the money to pay the tax? I'm forced to sell off part of the land? What, every year? Until I don't own anything anymore?

alex_young 9y ago
They could sell some of the stock to pay for that the same way their employees do when their stock grants mature couldn't they?
- imgabe 9y ago
  So you're forced to slowly give up more and more of your company? What if you're trying to keep a certain percentage to maintain control?
  - s17n 9y ago
    You can't. The whole point of a wealth tax is to prevent people/families from staying wealthy forever.
    - vixen99 9y ago
      The acquisition of wealth is not a zero sum game so why would you want people/families to get poorer ('stop them from staying wealthy forever'). How about getting people to climb up rather than forcing some down? Your idea of the 'point of a wealth tax' is a curious one. I am not aware anyone has suggested this aside from failed communist regimes where remarkably, some families at the apex who make/made the rules continue/continued to live rather well.
      - s17n 9y ago
        The current conversation about a wealth tax was jumpstarted by Thomas Piketty, who argues that the natural tendency of a capitalist economy is to make the rich get richer and the poor to get poorer (relative to each other - in absolute terms everybody should be getting richer). Basically the point of the wealth tax is to provide a counterweight to that tendency.
  - keithnz 9y ago
    Again, depends on a wealth tax, but if its the same as the tax you'd pay if you had that wealth sitting in the bank, and its worth billions but you never get a return, then very very slowly you'd lose tiny fractions of your company. Yes. But that would be a very odd situation
keithnz 9y ago
Depends on how you design it. But if your wealth is tied up purely in stock that gives you no return in terms of cash, then yes, you'd likely have to sell some of that stock.
keithnz 9y ago
Responding to the Edit about land: Well actually wealth tax is often used as an idea to control property prices. If you own $10 million in land. That land makes you no money, you'd have to work out how to make money from the land or diversify to make a minimum return that covers the tax. The consequence of which is land/property becomes a less desirable investment compared to say investing in businesses unless that land actually makes a return. Theirs pros and cons and a lot of discussion on wealth tax etc. But taxing income also has pros and cons. The question is do you want tax to tax evenly across peoples wealth, or do you want it to tax evenly across income? or some mixture of both?