Ah OK, taxing the living shit out of companies or the investors and giving that money to people who spend it immediately seems to me to have nothing to do with

Ah OK, taxing the living shit out of companies or the investors and giving that money to people who spend it immediately seems to me to have nothing to do with companies using their profits on buybacks or dividends. Even with more taxes, some companies are going to do well enough to have made more money than they know what to do with, and sometimes returning money to the investors is probably their best option.