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Jeff Bezos' net worth was ~$33,600,000,000 at the beginning of 2017. I would argue things are considerably worse for the average American since then. It's not t

Jeff Bezos' net worth was ~$33,600,000,000 at the beginning of 2017. I would argue things are considerably worse for the average American since then. It's not the wealth, it's the level of inequality that the wealth is indicative of. If every American had healthcare and access to quality education, housing, and food, it would not matter to me how wealthy Jeff Bezos gets. It's about the floor, not the ceiling, but the floor comes first. > Oh, so anyone with more power than you is bad? What about people that don't even have the privilege of arguing on HN? Snore. If you really want to reduce things to personal jabs, that's cool I guess. I was using myself as a stand-in for an average person - feel free to substitute any name that makes your heart warm. > I would probably agree there's limits that should be imposed so that anyone can't just push around whatever law they want but at the same time, how else would you suggest these things work? Sever the links between money and political power. Limit private ownership of news organizations. Take away the tools that are being abused. > Since we're talking about taxes... I checked out the section called "Tax Policy" Social Security taxes and Medicare Taxes; and most New Deal programs were financed by the Revenue Act of 1932 [1] passed in the year FDR was campaigning on the New Deal. Again, I didn't realize you were going to be a pendant, otherwise I would have linked more specifically. My b. > How do you reason all these things are "caused by concentrated wealth"? Slavery was propagated by the concentrated wealth of the southern aristocracy. They rebelled when they felt that their wealth was threatened. Similarly, in Europe, World War 1 was a war of prestige and conquest fought between a bunch of wealthy (largely related) families who had built huge empires. > The big picture is made up of individual policies... that is actually my entire point. I gave you clear example of what happens when one fails to remember the big picture. You mocked me a bit and told me I should have the answers, but I didn't see any clear examples. You are wrong about the first point - you can nitpick implementations and individual policies all day. I'm not claiming that 100% of policies that tax the wealthy are good, or will succeed. The big picture is important because it abstracts those smaller points away - the bigger picture is that inequality is driving our societal issues, and taxing the wealthy is an obvious, primary way to help remedy that. Talking about a Swedish wealth tax from 1990 is a joke. [1] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Revenue_Act_of_1932 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Revenue_Act_of_1932

robswc 6y ago
>Jeff Bezos' net worth was ~$33,600,000,000 at the beginning of 2017. I would argue things are considerably worse for the average American since then Based on what metrics? >If every American had healthcare and access to quality education, housing, and food, it would not matter to me how wealthy Jeff Bezos gets These aren't mutually exclusive though... >Snore. If you really want to reduce things to personal jabs, that's cool I guess. I was using myself as a stand-in for an average person - feel free to substitute any name that makes your heart warm. If you're arguing on HN you're most likely not the average person. Even then, how would you quantify how much political "power" someone should/could have? >Sever the links between money and political power. Limit private ownership of news organizations. Take away the tools that are being abused. Sure. You're just going to run into problems trying to define "tools" and "being abused". And I'm saying that as someone that agrees there are problems with abuse of power. >otherwise I would have linked more specifically Yes, cause otherwise you'll link to something and when I do "ctrl+F taxes" it wouldn't lead me to something that argues against your point ;) It doesn't say there how much revenue it generated. Do you have something you trust showing numbers for the revenue targets and how much it made? I find conflicting information. >Slavery was propagated by the concentrated wealth of the southern aristocracy. They rebelled when they felt that their wealth was threatened. Similarly, in Europe, World War 1 was a war of prestige and conquest fought between a bunch of wealthy (largely related) families who had built huge empires. You can have both slavery and wars without a "concentration of capital" as the driving factor. I'll say sure, its a factor. So is the "ability to own land" and half a million other things. >You mocked me a bit and told me I should have the answers, but I didn't see any clear examples. I linked to the wiki page detailing how a FTT pretty much destroyed swedish financial markets and did the opposite of what it intended to do. >Talking about a Swedish wealth tax from 1990 is a joke. ...? Literally everything you have mentioned is several times older than something from 1990. Also... it was introduced in 1984, 1990 is when they reversed it because it was so bad.
- arrosenberg 6y ago
  > Yes, cause otherwise you'll link to something and when I do "ctrl+F taxes" it wouldn't lead me to something that argues against your point ;) Yep, I underestimated your unmitigated pendantry. I suppose shouldn't have assumed that you would know that the New Deal involved raising revenue. Concise data from the 1930s isn't super easy to come by, you are going to have to look at broader economic trends and make your own conclusions. > Literally everything you have mentioned is several times older than something from 1990. Also... it was introduced in 1984, 1990 is when they reversed it because it was so bad. * Sweden GDP, 1984 (2020 dollars): $108,000,000 * US GDP, 1984 (2020 dollars): $4,000,000,000,000 The U.S. also has much greater reach into the financial markets since we control a lot of them. Older is better - more time to see the long-tail effects of policy. Regardless of whether FTT would work or not, it's a single tactic (small picture), when we already successfully tax wealth in various ways (estate, property taxes). The big picture is breaking the power of concentrated financial power, and taxation is an obvious method. Nit picking specific policies seems to be a favorite bad-faith tactic to avoid acknowledging that the issue is an issue, which would then require the nitpickers to suggest ideas themselves, instead of just criticizing.

robswc 6y ago

>Jeff Bezos' net worth was ~$33,600,000,000 at the beginning of 2017. I would argue things are considerably worse for the average American since then Based on what metrics? >If every American had healthcare and access to quality education, housing, and food, it would not matter to me how wealthy Jeff Bezos gets These aren't mutually exclusive though... >Snore. If you really want to reduce things to personal jabs, that's cool I guess. I was using myself as a stand-in for an average person - feel free to substitute any name that makes your heart warm. If you're arguing on HN you're most likely not the average person. Even then, how would you quantify how much political "power" someone should/could have? >Sever the links between money and political power. Limit private ownership of news organizations. Take away the tools that are being abused. Sure. You're just going to run into problems trying to define "tools" and "being abused". And I'm saying that as someone that agrees there are problems with abuse of power. >otherwise I would have linked more specifically Yes, cause otherwise you'll link to something and when I do "ctrl+F taxes" it wouldn't lead me to something that argues against your point ;) It doesn't say there how much revenue it generated. Do you have something you trust showing numbers for the revenue targets and how much it made? I find conflicting information. >Slavery was propagated by the concentrated wealth of the southern aristocracy. They rebelled when they felt that their wealth was threatened. Similarly, in Europe, World War 1 was a war of prestige and conquest fought between a bunch of wealthy (largely related) families who had built huge empires. You can have both slavery and wars without a "concentration of capital" as the driving factor. I'll say sure, its a factor. So is the "ability to own land" and half a million other things. >You mocked me a bit and told me I should have the answers, but I didn't see any clear examples. I linked to the wiki page detailing how a FTT pretty much destroyed swedish financial markets and did the opposite of what it intended to do. >Talking about a Swedish wealth tax from 1990 is a joke. ...? Literally everything you have mentioned is several times older than something from 1990. Also... it was introduced in 1984, 1990 is when they reversed it because it was so bad.

arrosenberg 6y ago
> Yes, cause otherwise you'll link to something and when I do "ctrl+F taxes" it wouldn't lead me to something that argues against your point ;) Yep, I underestimated your unmitigated pendantry. I suppose shouldn't have assumed that you would know that the New Deal involved raising revenue. Concise data from the 1930s isn't super easy to come by, you are going to have to look at broader economic trends and make your own conclusions. > Literally everything you have mentioned is several times older than something from 1990. Also... it was introduced in 1984, 1990 is when they reversed it because it was so bad. * Sweden GDP, 1984 (2020 dollars): $108,000,000 * US GDP, 1984 (2020 dollars): $4,000,000,000,000 The U.S. also has much greater reach into the financial markets since we control a lot of them. Older is better - more time to see the long-tail effects of policy. Regardless of whether FTT would work or not, it's a single tactic (small picture), when we already successfully tax wealth in various ways (estate, property taxes). The big picture is breaking the power of concentrated financial power, and taxation is an obvious method. Nit picking specific policies seems to be a favorite bad-faith tactic to avoid acknowledging that the issue is an issue, which would then require the nitpickers to suggest ideas themselves, instead of just criticizing.