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Majority of Americans favor wealth tax on very rich: poll
- derp_dee_derp 7y agothis is a classic case of tyranny of the majority. Majority of Americans favor stealing wealth from others.
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- spamizbad 7y agoThey're trying to recapture their economic contributions. Companies won't pay more, so they're doing it via other means. When salaries were rising such actions were not popular.
- mech1234 7y agoSalaries are rising now, though. https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/MEHOINUSA672N/ https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/MEHOINUSA672N/
- akhilcacharya 7y agoNearly everyone pays a form of wealth taxes in the form of property taxes. I see no reason why it should be different for the Rembrandts and the diamonds (if, of course, they could somehow be assessed at a level that exceeds ~$32 million to $50 million and more).
- the2and7 7y agonot really. From wikipedia: The scenarios in which tyranny perception occurs are very specific, involving a sort of distortion of democracy preconditions: - Centralization: when federation makes a decision that should be local. => NOT THE CASE. - Abandonment of rationality: when a decision "which bases its claim to rule upon numbers, not upon rightness or excellence" Unless you argue taxing is irrational.
- skitout 7y agoMy feeling is rich are "stealing" from others, and feel that we are in an oligopoly... :)
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- foolrush 7y agoYou are not a billionaire and will never be one. Calm down.
- pb7 7y agoYou don’t need to be a billionaire to think in a rational and unbiased way.
- munk-a 7y agoI really don't think that it becomes stealing until the wealthy are pulled down below the poor - and that isn't anywhere near being on the table, most of the wealth tax options would just shrink the band between the super rich and the rich. It's not clear if this survey laid out a starting point but Warren's proposal is to only tax excess wealth above 50mil and such a tax would almost certainly be graduated (so a 51M person would pay tax on 1M and a 52M would pay tax on 2M (probably double?)) either way the worst that happens is that unearning trustfunders are slowly reduced to 50M in assets over time which is more than enough money for anyone... and I'd hope that as inflation/cost of living rose that level would be adjusted - being a millionaire today is hardly rare with most people who own a house in a metro area easily falling in that range.
- uep 7y agoThis is grossly simplified, but I feel like I'm responding in kind. The fundamental nature of a non-co-op business is that the company gets more value per person than it costs to employ that person. Companies have been "stealing" wealth from employees since they've existed.
- SkyBelow 7y agoDo you see existing yearly property and car taxes as theft? In general, where does one draw the line between theft and taxes?
- akdetrick 7y agoThe average worker is 5x more productive than they were 30 years ago, but wages have been basically flat. In the last 10 years, the federal minimum wage has not risen, effectively reducing the minimum wage by about $1 due to inflation. The richest 500 people in the world grew their wealth by $1.2 trillion in 2019, a 25% increase over a period of one year. The minority build their wealth on the labor and taxes of the majority, but sure, adjusting the tax code is "stealing".
- DuskStar 7y agoIf workers are 5x more productive and wages are flat after inflation, why are profits also flat (after inflation and population growth)? This isn't a case of the corporate oligarchs taking a larger share, this is the pie not growing as fast as that 5x productivity improvement would imply.
- sdinsn 7y ago> The average worker is 5x more productive Productivity isn't due to workers alone. Most productivity has been gained through technological advances.
- skitout 7y agoSure, but how do we used to share the increase in productivity ? How do we share it now ? How should we share it ? ; My feeling is workers had been the "loser" those last 30 years in how are shared the productivity gain. Ethically I find it wrong. Economically this did not seemed to offer more growth or positive outcome...
- nightski 7y agoI feel the wealth inequality issue needs to be addressed. My only problem with the wealth tax is that it takes money from the wealthy and feeds it to the government. I am having a hard time connecting how that improves the situation of the lower and middle classes.
- sebazzz 7y agoIt helps if the money can be used to decrease tax on the lower classes or supply basic needs, like medical insurance.
- jandrese 7y agoYeah, it is a total mystery how adequately funding social welfare programs could somehow help the poor.
- zajd 7y agoWelcome to HN, where taxation is "stealing"
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- onepointsixC 7y agoBenefits and welfare programs have been increasing dramatically as a percentage of GDP.
- droopyEyelids 7y agoHave people been getting poorer to qualify for welfare?
- jandrese 7y agoYes, the increasing wealth gap has been killing America. That's what this program is trying to address.
- kevingadd 7y ago
- lawnchair_larry 7y agoAlternative title: Majority of Americans are not rich, and therefore see no downside to taking from those who are I do think the inequality gap is becoming more of a problem, but simply asking the population if they want someone else to pay more is going to have the obvious result.
- sephlietz 7y agoYour argument implies that a wealth tax has always been favored by a majority of Americans (since by definition a majority of Americans have always been not rich), which I think is not true. I think the truth is likely that personal wealth is but one of many factors in support for a wealth tax.
- munk-a 7y agoNo, the majority of Americans believe that everyone should live a decent life rather than a few random people living stupid wealthy lives while others suffer in poverty. I do agree that the sentiment is pretty deeply ingrained in American culture though, for a long time people have voted and advocated against their own interests because one day they might win the lottery and somehow make it through the insane taxes that come with that to qualify for a tax liability on their estate when they end up passing.
- akhilcacharya 7y agoI don't really care about wealth inequality, but from a revenue perspective a wealth tax seems fantastic _if_ can be enacted and enforced. Bill Gates came out in favor of a limited wealth tax as well - I think a mild cost to citizenship for the uber-wealthy is a great idea. Feels like political malpractice to not attempt it. Sidebar: > Kathy Herron, 56, a Republican who lives in Santa Rosa, California, said her support for Trump - a self-proclaimed billionaire - stems from his hardline policies on illegal immigration. In her view, the president would do well to support higher taxes on rich Americans. “We’re taxed from one end to the other, and it just seems the rich don’t pay their share,” she said. Welfare chauvinism is an underrated political force in America. The next re-alignment will most likely be along these lines.
- keanzu 7y agoBil Gates doesn't need any new taxes to help him transfer his money to the US government, he can do it right now with "Gifts to the United States." https://fiscal.treasury.gov/public/gifts-to-government.html https://fiscal.treasury.gov/public/gifts-to-government.html
- akhilcacharya 7y agohttps://www.gatesnotes.com/About-Bill-Gates/Year-in-Review-2019 https://www.gatesnotes.com/About-Bill-Gates/Year-in-Review-2... > When I say the government needs to raise more money, some people ask why Melinda and I don’t voluntarily pay more in taxes than the law requires. The answer is that simply leaving it up to people to give more than the government asks for is not a scalable solution. People pay taxes as an obligation of law and citizenship, not out of charity. Additional voluntary giving will never raise enough money for everything the government needs to do. If Melinda and I signed over our foundation’s entire endowment to the state of California, it wouldn’t be enough to fund their public schools for even one year. A vibrant economic system depends on setting expectations for who pays how much.
- lnanek2 7y ago> from a revenue perspective a wealth tax seems fantastic Amusingly, the current manifesto re wealth inequality, Capital in the Twenty-First Century, pointed out that confiscatory taxes on the rich would be pointless re a revenue perspective. It turns out there are so few rich (e.g. the 1%) that even if you take all their money, it doesn't really dent our large government expenditures spent on the majority. E.g. if the top tax rate went up to 70%, that would only be an extra 320 billion, which is only half medicare.
- nostromo 7y agoIt's worth noting that the income tax also started out as a tax on the very rich. Once established, taxes have a way of finding their way from the rich, to the middle-class, and then even to the working poor.
- throwno 7y agoThis is why the wealth tax will fail to fix inequality. Eventually your parents shitty 250k house out in the sticks will qualify for wealth tax. Whatever stocks you have that aren't in a retirement account will be wealth taxed even though half their growth is just from inflation. It's going to suck.
- akhilcacharya 7y agoIn most places it already qualifies for a wealth tax in the form of a property tax...
- sct202 7y agoExactly! A huge portion of the middle class's wealth is tied up in property equity that is taxed every year. The ultra wealthy's wealth is primarily in business ownership or equity which is only taxed on gains when it's sold.
- throwno 7y ago>The ultra wealthy's wealth is primarily in business ownership or equity which is only taxed on gains when it's sold. So for the rich to unlock their wealth and make it usable they have to pay a tax? Well, let's tax it again, why not? And as for property already be taxed? Why not have two taxes? The more taxes the better. The war with Iran isn't going to pay for itself.
- xienze 7y ago> primarily in business ownership Businesses which employ people and pay a whole host of taxes every year... > or equity which is only taxed on gains when it's sold. How would it be fair to tax someone on an asset that only has a theoretical value, which isn’t realized until it’s actually sold?
- Bostonian 7y agoIf 99% of people vote to impose a tax paid only by 1%, that violates the spirit of "no taxation without representation". That would be universally recognized if, for example, the right-handed voted to raise taxes on the left-handed. Related article: "Millionaires support a wealth tax — as long as they aren’t getting taxed: CNBC survey" https://www.cnbc.com/2019/12/23/millionaires-support-a-wealth-tax-as-long-as-they-arent-getting-taxed.html https://www.cnbc.com/2019/12/23/millionaires-support-a-wealt... . It found that the majority of millionaires supported a wealth tax that kicks in at $50 million, but not at $10 million -- because they fear it would hit them, now or in the future. Using the tax code to pull people down is morally wrong.
- art0rz 7y ago> no taxation without representation On the other hand, the 1% have enough money to influence politics through lobbying and "donations"
- Frondo 7y agoI'm confused. There are many taxes that only apply to a subset of people. Property taxes only apply to property owners, soda taxes only apply to people buying soda, gas taxes to people buying gas. Tax credits apply to certain people, too, like the EITC or mortgage credits. What makes this qualitatively different to you? Also, everyone can vote, so everyone in theory has equal representation. (in practice, the wealthy have a lot more time in their reps' ears than the poor, so they arguably already have a greater representation than your typical voter.)
- dx87 7y agoAll the taxes you listed are tied to specific things. A generic wealth tax is saying that no matter how you got your money, there should be a cap on it. It's like locality pay, but on a national scale. I don't know if it's the right idea or not, but it's application is arbitrary enough that it's different than the other taxes.
- akhilcacharya 7y agoI read a thread on /r/FatFIRE about a possible wealth tax. To my surprise, many supported it because they concluded it was impossible to accrue $50 million (specifically the Warren plan) just by saving aggressively and index-fund investing. Due to the exponential nature of wealth distribution I'd imagine there are far, far more millionaires with $5 million than there are with $50 million.
- aazaa 7y ago> A wealth tax is levied on an individual’s net worth, such as stocks, bonds and real estate, as well as cash holdings, similar in concept to property taxes. It is separate from an income tax, which applies to wages, interest and dividends, among other sources. One often overlooked issue with a wealth tax is the damaging effect on financial privacy. The income tax already has the IRS probing into nooks and crannies it has no business probing. It deputizes law-abiding businesses to snitch on each other through the obligation to report payments. A wealth tax would ratchet the surveillance up even further. Not, not just income statements, but asset statements would be required. Enforcement would likely require reams of new compulsory snitching laws for sellers of property. It's not an outcome I think many respondents have though through much because privacy still flies well below the radar in the US. Then there are unintended consequences. If you tax income, it re-appears as capital appreciation. If you tax assets, they will re-appear as invisible wealth. That's an outcome for which I doubt most in the country are prepared.
- hyperhopper 7y agoCapital appreciation is already taxed
- leetcrew 7y agoafaik, you don't actually report asset purchases to the government. at the time of sale, you report the cost basis and sale price and pay tax on any gains. unless I'm mistaken on how the reporting works, this is much less intrusive than having to give the government an asset list every year.
- WhompingWindows 7y agoI don't understand privacy well, can you provide specifics of which nooks/crannies of the wealthy need to be private from the IRS? Also, do you think wealth inequality is a problem, and if so, what'd be your alternative proposition to fix it?
- aazaa 7y agoConsider how Joe, a poor person, will prove to the IRS that he has no assets to tax. Proving a negative is impossible, unless you're working with a closed system. You can make the financial system closed by requiring all income and all assets to be reported to the IRS. The only way this works is if we all file asset statements, rich and poor. And that means an end to one of the last remaining forms of financial privacy - for everyone, not just the rich.
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- mech1234 7y agoThe 2% wealth tax idea floated by Warren is an insanely high number. It sounds small because people don't understand finance. A 4% withdrawal rate is about the most you can expect to indefinitely draw on a balanced portfolio without it disappearing in a relatively small number of years. A 2% wealth tax takes half of this.
- ohazi 7y agoI'm skeptical that most respondents understood the questions correctly. Most people are familiar with income tax, because they know that money is removed from their paycheck every month. Many also file tax returns. A wealth tax, where a fraction of your bank balance is removed every month, is a totally alien concept to most people. If you haven't thought about it before, it can take a minute or two to wrap your head around what it would actually mean. In a survey context, all of these questions can be answered on autopilot by mistaking "wealth tax for rich people" with "higher taxes for rich people," which are definitely not the same thing. Whether or not you think a wealth tax is a good idea, I don't think we should let politicians sneak this through unless we're confident that the public actually understands what is being proposed. As other comments mentioned, income taxes started out as "wealthy only" and have since trickled down to the working poor. I don't think most Americans want a tax on their bank balance. Edit: No, I'm not arguing that people are dumb, just that they tend to rush through surveys. When rushing, I think this would be an easy mistake to make.
- tempsy 7y agowhy have such low confidence in the intelligence of Americans? people aren't dumb, and if it was just a higher income tax it would be called such.
- _jal 7y agoIt tends to be selective. When the speaker agrees with survey results, then it is clearly just common sense.
- CPLX 7y agoIt's not totally alien at all. It's the way we finance nearly all our local governments and school systems. Tallying up property and paying a tax on it annually is something literally everyone does.
- JoshTriplett 7y agoI would venture a guess that "property tax" doesn't quite feel the same as a wealth tax to most people, because most people don't have a paid-off house, so it's just one more component of their mortgage (and paid through an escrow account rather than directly). If you're paying a large aggregated bill anyway, it feels like just one more tax associated with money changing hands. If your house is fully paid off, such that your only remaining costs on it are property taxes and insurance, then you're already far more well-off than the majority of people. Also, financing schools and other local services via property taxes is a bad idea; doing so perpetuates inequality by giving more funding to services in more expensive neighborhoods.
- throwawaysea 7y agoAlmost every country that has enacted a wealth tax has repealed it. And the version that Elizabeth Warren is proposing is fairly extreme - her 3% wealth tax rate would be double the 1.5% rate that France ended up repealing (https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2019-11-14/france-s-wealth-tax-should-be-a-warning-for-warren-and-sanders https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2019-11-14/france...). Personally I can’t get behind this idea because it just feels like it is taking away something you’ve already earned and own outright for whatever purpose you want. It waters down the concept of private ownership, which is a gateway for other erosions of individual rights. I also just can’t see the government putting a large general fund to good use. This image shows what various billionaires would have been left with if a wealth tax were in place since 1982 (https://media.newyorker.com/photos/5d7a63377d7e360008bd5fbe/master/w_1454,c_limit/Cassidy-WealthTax-3-final.png https://media.newyorker.com/photos/5d7a63377d7e360008bd5fbe/...). Bill Gates would have only $36b left - and he’s donated around that much to his foundation. Clearly if he felt the government was good at allocating and efficiently spending large funds, he would have given the government a bigger payment (https://fiscal.treasury.gov/public/gifts-to-government.html https://fiscal.treasury.gov/public/gifts-to-government.html) rather than starting his own foundation. This is why I don’t buy his recently claimed support for a wealth tax.
- zaphod420 7y agoThis is good for Bitcoin.
- m11a 7y agoIndeed! Rather than losing 5% of your wealth in the form of taxes to the US government, you can lose 200% in the form of cryptocurrency wealth redistribution and volatility.
- forrestthewoods 7y agoYes. People often favor vague concepts that don’t appear to impact them. And often oppose actual policies when one is written and subjected to scrutiny. The devil is always in the details.
- tempsy 7y agoI honestly think so much of what we take as "normal" in society today will change dramatically once Millennials become dominant holders of political offices.
- 0x8BADF00D 7y agoA wealth tax is unconstitutional. From the Constitution: “Representatives and direct taxes shall be apportioned among the several states which may be included within this union, according to their respective numbers, which shall be determined by adding to the whole number of free persons, including those bound to service for a term of years, and excluding Indians not taxed, three fifths of all other Persons.“ How do you calculate a wealth tax on a house? How about a piece of art? This is nonsensical and shows how uneducated the average American is, to support this socialist nonsense.
- jshaqaw 7y agoPretty sure much of the existing state and local tax base is already funded by a wealth tax called property taxes. I agree implementation gets harder when you get into more escoteric assets like art.
- ben509 7y ago> How about a piece of art? They already have to do it to determine tax deductions. It's pretty subjective: https://www.irs.gov/appeals/art-appraisal-services https://www.irs.gov/appeals/art-appraisal-services
- DuskStar 7y agoStrictly speaking, it means you can still have a wealth tax, it just has to average out to the same amount per person in each state. Which would go rather poorly for the poorest states.
- sdinsn 7y ago> How do you calculate a wealth tax on a house? A wealth tax on houses already exists: property taxes. Are you saying property taxes are unconstitutional?
- m11a 7y agoThe biggest issue I have with this is: > "the very rich should be allowed to keep the money they have, even if that means increasing inequality," Wording a question like that is so... biased. Maybe we should work on fixing how the enormous amount of tax money is spent now before asking taxpayers for more? $700bn in funding for military (around $1tn all funds considered), yet there's "increasing inequality". US spends 2x the amount the UK does on health per capita, yet the UK can afford single payer health. Administration costs are through the roof. I think this is a case where "throwing more money at the problem" isn't the right solution.
- DuskStar 7y agoHell, there's NOT increasing inequality by sane definitions - meaning if you count government taxes and transfers. Yes, pre-tax, no-transfer income inequality has increased, but by definition increasing taxes and transfers won't fix that. And once you include ss/welfare/snap/eitc/etc as well as taxes, income inequality today has barely changed over the past century. And the recent "increasing wealth inequality" papers have based on the dubious assumption that "wealth = capital gains income / risk-free instantaneous rate of return", [0] which means that wealth goes up as interest rates go down if income holds steady. 0: https://johnhcochrane.blogspot.com/2020/01/wealth-and-taxes-part-v.html https://johnhcochrane.blogspot.com/2020/01/wealth-and-taxes-...
- esoterica 7y agoJust tax capital gains as income if you want to hit the rich. Wealth taxes are both harder to implement and enforce than income taxes (e.g. how do you appraise an illiquid asset) while conferring no meaningful advantages.
- Miner49er 7y agoWhy not both? I believe Bernie's plan, for example, is to do both.
- esoterica 7y agoBecause wealth taxes are harder to implement than income taxes while being economically isomorphic to them. The great triumph of financialization is establishing a clear equivalence between present value and future cash flows, so taxing one vs the other is tomato tomato.
- munk-a 7y agoI was disappointed to recently learn that Canada also has capital gain tax loophole weirdness - up here income from capital gains is counted half, so if you make 75k in salary and get a 50k payout from options when your company is acquired then you're taxed as if you made 100k... there is no distinction for capital gains from primary property ownership or any other limitations, all capital gains at 50%.
- makomk 7y agoWealth taxes became a big part of American political discourse because your populist politicians realised they can promise voters astoundingly expensive things by framing them as being just a small percentage of the wealth of ultra-wealthy folks like Jeff Bezos. You can't pull off that rhetorical trick by taxing capital gains. Of course, in reality I don't think this would work anyway. All that wealth only exists on paper - it's just the nominal values of their shareholdings at the current market price, and if you make everyone sell at once that price plummets and the illusion disappears. I'm not sure it even makes sense on a fundamental economic level. You can't turn shares in Amazon into healthcare in the way that you could, say, Bezos buying a less fancy yacht. Even though the yacht and the healthcare use different resources, other businesses in the economy with a choice between what resources they use to make their products receive pricing pressure to change that choice and ultimately, it should all sort itself out in the end. That doesn't work here. The only way for the sums to work out is for other people who would actually buy things to forgoe purchases worth as much as whatever you want to fund and buy Amazon shares with them instead - and the whole reason populist politicians want to frame this in terms of wealth in the first place is because what they want to fund is huge compared to the size of the US economy.
- txsoftwaredev 7y agoWhy would the ultra wealthy not just store their assets in another country? Businesses and individuals routinely move to different states to avoid higher taxes.
- virmundi 7y agoBecause so much of their wealth are denominated in US equities. If your stocks are in the NY stock exchange, you can’t move them beyond the US government’s reach.
- jshaqaw 7y agoMost everyone supports a wealth tax. Most everyone thinks wealth starts at a level way higher than themselves.
- apta 7y agoWhat's the cutoff for a "very rich" person when it comes to these taxes?
- Miner49er 7y agoBernie's wealth tax starts at a wealth of $32 million.
- Pigo 7y agoA lot of people think we didn't land on the moon, and that the Earth is flat.
- mindcrime 7y agoSo much of what needs to be said on this subject has already been said, and said long ago. I'll just leave this here: What is law? What ought it to be? What is its domain? What are its limits? Where, in fact, does the prerogative of the legislator stop? I have no hesitation in answering, Law is common force organized to prevent injustice;—in short, Law is Justice. It is not true that the legislator has absolute power over our persons and property, since they pre-exist, and his work is only to secure them from injury. It is not true that the mission of the law is to regulate our consciences, our ideas, our will, our education, our sentiments, our works, our exchanges, our gifts, our enjoyments. Its mission is to prevent the rights of one from interfering with those of another, in any one of these things. Law, because it has force for its necessary sanction, can only have the domain of force, which is justice. And as every individual has a right to have recourse to force only in cases of lawful defense, so collective force, so which is only the union of individual forces, cannot be rationally used for any other end. The law, then, is solely the organization of individual rights that existed before law. ### Legal plunder has two roots: one of them, as we have already seen, is in human greed; the other is in misconceived philanthropy. Before I proceed, I think I ought to explain myself upon the word plunder. I do not take it, as it often is taken, in a vague, undefined, relative, or metaphorical sense. I use it in its scientific acceptation, and as expressing the opposite idea to property. When a portion of wealth passes out of the hands of him who has acquired it, without his consent, and without compensation, to him who has not created it, whether by force or by artifice, I say that property is violated, that plunder is perpetrated. I say that this is exactly what the law ought to repress always and everywhere. If the law itself performs the action it ought to repress, I say that plunder is still perpetrated, and even, in a social point of view, under aggravated circumstances. In this case, however, he who profits from the plunder is not responsible for it; it is the law, the lawgiver, society itself, and this is where the political danger lies. It is to be regretted that there is something offensive in the word. I have sought in vain for another, for I would not wish at any time, and especially just now, to add an irritating word to our disagreements; therefore, whether I am believed or not, I declare that I do not mean to impugn the intentions nor the morality of anybody. I am attacking an idea that I believe to be false—a system that appears to me to be unjust; and this is so independent of intentions, that each of us profits by it without wishing it, and suffers from it without being aware of the cause. Any person must write under the influence of party spirit or of fear, who would call into question the sincerity of protectionism, of socialism, and even of communism, which are one and the same plant, in three different periods of its growth. All that can be said is, that plunder is more visible by its partiality in protectionism, 3 and by its universality in communism; whence it follows that, of the three systems, socialism is still the most vague, the most undefined, and consequently the most sincere. Be that as it may, to conclude that legal plunder has one of its roots in misconceived philanthropy, is evidently to put intentions out of the question. With this understanding, let us examine the value, the origin, and the tendency of this popular aspiration, which pretends to realize the general good by general plunder. The Socialists say, since the law organizes justice, why should it not organize labor, instruction, and religion? Why? Because it could not organize labor, instruction, and religion, without disorganizing justice. For remember, that law is force, and that consequently the domain of the law cannot properly extend beyond the domain of force. Bastiat - The Law http://www.gutenberg.org/files/44800/44800-h/44800-h.htm http://www.gutenberg.org/files/44800/44800-h/44800-h.htm
- dorchadas 7y agoJust wanted to say, I'm currently reading Good Economics for Hard Times by Banerjee and Duflo (the 2019 Nobel Prize winners), and it talks about this. It's a really interesting read about how we can make a more just society without giving up on capitalism as a whole, and quite a shocking transition from what you hear a lot on TV or from older economists (about trickle down, etc.). I'd recommend everyone read it; I got it from library, but now want to go buy my own copy to keep coming back to and rereading.
- RickJWagner 7y agoI tend to vote Republican, I don't oppose a more progressive tax. So long as the heavier taxes stay safely above middle class, I think it's a fair idea. To get broad support, crafty lefties need only emphasize how much the taxes will affect Hollywood blowhards. That'll make the whole thing much more palatable to those on the right side of the aisle.
- methodiosmel 7y agoMajority of Americans are wrong.
- nojvek 7y agoHere’s where things get tricky. The ultra wealthy have most of their wealth tied up in stocks/bonds. Bill Gates and Bezos are the worlds richest because they have >1% ownership in their founding companies. The rich get richer because the stock market and their companies are doing well. They own means of production. Capital gains tax rate means if you hold stock for more than an year and sell it, you get taxed a bit less. There’s an incentive for longer term ownership. Like property taxes, what if you taxed holding stock? Then that’s unfair as AMT crap. Holding stock is fake money. It could disappear in thin air when market crashes. Gains are only realized when you sell. But when you sell, you still pay income tax. So if a billionaire has ownership in his founding company but draws <100k of real income from stock, should they be taxed higher than a person who just makes 100k of salary? I’m all for higher tax percentages at higher incomes but all of it gets very murky. America was built on the foundations of if you work hard and build something great and have a pie of ownership, you get to reap the rewards. Removing this ^ incentive causes all sorts of issues in other parts. I would love estate tax to have a higher tax rate. Transferring property to kids shouldn’t be cheap since they didn’t do the hard work. I would also love taxes to be 0 below a certain income bracket. I would also love some form of aid when unemployed/ on the streets. Some sort of buffer. Better affordable healthcare. Less middleman. More transparency. A lot of this problems aren’t money related but more about refactoring the current way of things and making more efficient use of what’s currently already there. My 2 cents. Would love to debate.