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I wanted to disagree with your post, but after giving it some thought, I believe that you're right. People will simply start to shift their wealth into areas t

I wanted to disagree with your post, but after giving it some thought, I believe that you're right. People will simply start to shift their wealth into areas that are loophole advantaged or hide it altogether in trusts, relatives and even something as banal as precious metals under the pillow. It will never work.

jakelazaroff 5y ago
This is a little like saying that we just shouldn't have laws, because people will find ways to circumvent them.
- uejfiweun 5y ago
  If the target of a law can circumvent the law, and the law ends up harming regular middle and working class people, then yes we should not have this law.
AnthonyMouse 5y ago
I'm fairly convinced that "wealth tax" is one of these things like "forgive student loans" that gets floated by people whose goal is to actually do nothing. Because the idea is very bad, but it sounds good. So instead of the people who understand the dynamics and the people who want to make positive change working together to support something that would actually work, they spend all their time fighting each other. You spend years arguing and the best case is that you defeat the proposal for a bad idea that makes things worse, which is also the goal of the people distracting you away from doing something that would actually work.
- hotpotamus 5y ago
  Can you please tell the supposedly low tax state of Texas that these wealth taxes are a bad idea? I've got to pay mine to them in a few days.
  - AnthonyMouse 5y ago
    Texas has a wealth tax? When did this happen?
    - dragonwriter 5y ago
      > Texas has a wealth tax? Every US jurisdiction has at least one; it's called “property tax”, a wealth tax that has very broad exceptions (i.e., everything except real estate.) Texas has the 6th highest of the 50 states + DC.
      - AnthonyMouse 5y ago
        Taxing land is kind of different because the owner didn't create it and it's not possible for anyone to cause more to exist. See discussion of Georgism etc. Taxing buildings is a bad idea for the same kinds of reasons as a wealth tax is a bad idea, but an actual wealth tax doesn't have exceptions. Or if it does, that makes it even worse, because whatever the exceptions are will create a powerful arbitrage opportunity. Which, in the case of property tax, is one of the reasons we under-invest in housing construction and have high housing costs. (Restrictive zoning is an even larger factor, but might not be if property tax mill rates were higher.)
        dragonwriter 5y ago
        > Taxing land is kind of different because the owner didn't create it and it's not possible for anyone to cause more to exist. Neither one of those things is categorically true of land (artificial land is a thing.) > Taxing buildings is a bad idea for the same kinds of reasons as a wealth tax is a bad idea. Whether or not it's a bad idea, it in fact exists, which was the question. > but an actual wealth tax doesn't have exceptions That's an unusual definition and doesn't seem like it matches any actual proposals that have been discussed with that name. > Or if it does, that makes it even worse, because whatever the exceptions are will create a powerful arbitrage opportunity. Why is this unconditionally a bad thing? > Which, in the case of property tax, is one of the reasons we under-invest in housing construction and have high housing costs. It’s really not, if it was, that problem would be inversely correlated with property tax rates, since those would determine the strength of that incentive.

jakelazaroff 5y ago

This is a little like saying that we just shouldn't have laws, because people will find ways to circumvent them.

uejfiweun 5y ago
If the target of a law can circumvent the law, and the law ends up harming regular middle and working class people, then yes we should not have this law.

AnthonyMouse 5y ago

I'm fairly convinced that "wealth tax" is one of these things like "forgive student loans" that gets floated by people whose goal is to actually do nothing. Because the idea is very bad, but it sounds good. So instead of the people who understand the dynamics and the people who want to make positive change working together to support something that would actually work, they spend all their time fighting each other. You spend years arguing and the best case is that you defeat the proposal for a bad idea that makes things worse, which is also the goal of the people distracting you away from doing something that would actually work.

hotpotamus 5y ago
Can you please tell the supposedly low tax state of Texas that these wealth taxes are a bad idea? I've got to pay mine to them in a few days.
- AnthonyMouse 5y ago
  Texas has a wealth tax? When did this happen?
  - dragonwriter 5y ago
    > Texas has a wealth tax? Every US jurisdiction has at least one; it's called “property tax”, a wealth tax that has very broad exceptions (i.e., everything except real estate.) Texas has the 6th highest of the 50 states + DC.
    - AnthonyMouse 5y ago
      Taxing land is kind of different because the owner didn't create it and it's not possible for anyone to cause more to exist. See discussion of Georgism etc. Taxing buildings is a bad idea for the same kinds of reasons as a wealth tax is a bad idea, but an actual wealth tax doesn't have exceptions. Or if it does, that makes it even worse, because whatever the exceptions are will create a powerful arbitrage opportunity. Which, in the case of property tax, is one of the reasons we under-invest in housing construction and have high housing costs. (Restrictive zoning is an even larger factor, but might not be if property tax mill rates were higher.)
      - dragonwriter 5y ago
        > Taxing land is kind of different because the owner didn't create it and it's not possible for anyone to cause more to exist. Neither one of those things is categorically true of land (artificial land is a thing.) > Taxing buildings is a bad idea for the same kinds of reasons as a wealth tax is a bad idea. Whether or not it's a bad idea, it in fact exists, which was the question. > but an actual wealth tax doesn't have exceptions That's an unusual definition and doesn't seem like it matches any actual proposals that have been discussed with that name. > Or if it does, that makes it even worse, because whatever the exceptions are will create a powerful arbitrage opportunity. Why is this unconditionally a bad thing? > Which, in the case of property tax, is one of the reasons we under-invest in housing construction and have high housing costs. It’s really not, if it was, that problem would be inversely correlated with property tax rates, since those would determine the strength of that incentive.