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"The rich don’t owe society, exactly the opposite" This is precisely wrong. The rich do indeed owe society. They owe their wealth to the workers working for th
by Sporktacular 4y ago
"The rich don’t owe society, exactly the opposite"
This is precisely wrong. The rich do indeed owe society. They owe their wealth to the workers working for them. To the education system that educated their workers and made them productive, the roads that brought them to work and the health system that keeps them at work.
This is obvious from the number of millionaires produced by healthy, educated, stable societies vs others. Other countries produce fewer and then only natural resource millionaires in the favour of the ruling elites. But they can't do so without labour and the resources owned by those societies. The rich owe almost everything not produced by their own hands.
And comparing the figures of corruption in those countries to that of charities generally is so absurd it's laughable.
- mulmen 4y agoOstensibly wealth is a settled debt.
- Sporktacular 4y agoOstensibly. 'Owe' is more than accounting parlance.
- mulmen 4y agoIs it? This is social accounting. It all translates.
- Sporktacular 4y agoYeah. Just as wealth is more than accounting parlance.
- dotancohen 4y ago> They owe their wealth to the workers working for > them. To the education system that educated their > workers and made them productive, the roads that > brought them to work and the health system that > keeps them at work. Assuming that they've paid their taxes, they've paid their debt.
- kqr 4y agoAssuming further that the taxes accurately measure the benefit that comes from the interaction of luck, privilege and society. Assuming even further that taxes effectively redistribute wealth to workers, educators, and nurturers. These are together three assumptions, none of which I think are true.
- closeparen 4y agoTaxes are the price we pay for society. Quite! Well, a price never fully captures the value to the buyer of what they're acquiring. Otherwise they'd be worse off for making the exchange. We cooperate because we both gain more than we lose from said cooperation. That's a great and beautiful thing.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- Sporktacular 4y agoThis is a lazy libertarian talking point. When someone accepts come award saying he owes his success to his family/mentor/agent, it's not an IOU for some cash value. But even if it was, how would you quantify whether a tax rate captures the full, less-tangible value of what a society provides? If through lobbying or creative accounting, a billionaire is able to reduce his yearly taxable income to $100 then he's met your definition of fully paid-up, when obviously he 'owes' (in the ethical, non-accounting sense) a lot more. Because society provides more than just economic opportunity, taxes are just one of the things we're required to pay back. We're expected to follow the law or sometimes fight for it (giving up some of our absolute freedoms), to be helpful or follow hundreds of other social conventions. If you insist on reducing all that to a tax rate, then it's so low that it points to a welfare state for the rich.
- closeparen 4y agoIndeed, the rich owe society for all these things. The amount they owe is called the price. And the time for which they owe it is from the moment of services rendered until the invoice is paid. Some of them, indeed, weasel out of paying the agreed-upon prices for their inputs. A certain former President comes to mind. But once paid, the debts are clear.